Union of the Stars: The 220th Hunger Games
by asa-hanada
Summary: Panem has a common enemy to unite it: evolved humans called Mu. No one knows where they come from, but their psychic abilities are devastating. Now the Mu fight to the death in the Games while the Capitol and Districts watch on. Little does everyone know, conspiracy is at the heart of the Mu's existence and it happens to be written into the design of this year's arena. SYOT Closed!
1. Intro, A Capitol Mu

**Union of the Stars: The 220th Hunger Games**

 **SYOT: CLOSED**

 **Summary:**

After years and years of rebellion, all of Panem finally has a common enemy to unite them: a species of evolved humans called Mu. No one knows where they come from, only that their psychic abilities are devastating and manifest between the ages of 12 and 18. A deadly Mu revolt 50 years ago changed the face of Panem and the rules of the Hunger Games forever. Now the Mu are the ones fighting to the death while the Capitol and Districts watch on.

But little do the citizens of Panem and even the Mu themselves know...conspiracy lies at the heart of the Mu's existence, and it so happens to be written into the design of this year's arena.

 **Acknowledgements:**

 _The Mu, associated plotlines, and a few of my side characters and tributes are adapted from a classic science fiction manga called Toward the Terra by Keiko Takemiya._

 _A huge thanks to everyone who submitted and continues to show an interest in this story! It wouldn't exist without you. I really did not anticipate receiving so many submissions, and all of them exceeded my expectations at that. I hope I can do them justice!_

 **Extra Content:**

 _If you are interested in worldbuilding notes, side character profiles, and updates on my progress, please visit my tumblr, mihanada - tumblr - com (_ _replace - with .)_

 _Side stories/ficlets for all tributes and side characters are cross-posted to tumblr and here (under the name Union of the Stars: Side Stories)._

 _I also created a website for this story at unionofthestars - weebly - com (replace - with .) It's a fun mock-up site for Panem's 'Department of Psionic Research', here to tell you all about the Mu (or, at least all that the Capitol wants you to know about the Mu!)._

* * *

 _Psionic Research Facility Lower Level 1, Department of Psionic Research_

 _The Capitol, Panem_

Kayvan fastens a thin metal bracelet around each of his wrists, vaguely wondering how the engineering department managed to fit psion suppressors into the narrow bands and whether they will hold up if a Mu decides to attack him. His superior assured him that none of the Capitol or Victor Mu would dare do such a thing, but Kayvan has his doubts. Everyone has seen the destructive power of those psion waves they wield against each other in the Games. Kayvan, with his normal human body, will be nothing but a blood splat on the wall if they use their powers on him.

One of his senior colleagues with far more experience than him follows in his footsteps to observe his session with the Mu he has been placed in charge of. The weight of her boots on the thick metal flooring is comforting as he takes a deep breath and steels himself to step through the doors into the holding area. When he is prepared, or as well prepared as he can be given the circumstances, he taps out the code and the doors slide open with a soft hiss. A blinking light above the door flashes in warning. They have five seconds to walk through before it closes again.

"CR-04," he says under his breath as they step beyond the threshold.

Cell doors line the hallway. There are far more resting just beneath the research facility than he ever thought possible. The average citizen is aware that the Capitol houses both the dangerous Victor Mu and their more docile Capitol counterparts, but even Kayvan had no idea there are this many. And he was born and raised in this city, too.

They pass many of the narrow cells filled with human-shaped beings. A scientist called Clemence dubbed them 'Mu' over seventy years ago, when the first one was found in District 6 and brought to the Capitol for examination.

"What do the letters stand for?" his colleague asks suddenly. A pop quiz of sorts. She said earlier that the department is fed up with hiring newbies who have no clue what they are working with before stepping into the building.

"Capitol, red type," he answers as he passes doors with green labels on the front. "Red types excel at amplification and object glazing."

Her lack of response tells him it was correct. They pass the rows of cells with green labels and into the reds.

Cell CR-04 is two rows in, locked with a keypad identical to all the others in the building.

Kayvan taps out the code his colleague gave him earlier. The codes change every few hours to avoid mishaps, so he stops repeating it in his head the moment the keypad blinks green in approval. He won't need it ever again.

The door slides open, revealing a sleet grey room with a white cot, toilet, sink, and a narrow bookshelf filled with the oddest baubles. It's cramped beyond belief, smaller than any of the closets back at home, but large enough to house a single human-shaped being.

A male Mu is sitting on the bed, absently playing with a wooden spring puzzle similar to one Kayvan remembers having as a child.

The Mu's file says that he is only a year, two months, five hours, seven minutes, and thirty-one seconds younger than Kayvan. Unlike the Victor Mu, who lead relatively normal lives before manifesting their inhuman natures, this Mu has been in the facility for twenty-one years. Kayvan cannot imagine growing up in a room this small, but the Mu appears fairly content and almost at peace.

A pair of brown eyes with a green tint to them turn to stare at Kayvan. The Mu looks utterly human, with a small smile on his face and a polite incline of his head. He sets the puzzle on the bed next to him carefully, then gets to his feet just as slowly. When he is finally in front of Kayvan, the smile has faded to a neutral expression.

Kayvan almost doesn't know what to say. His colleague said that he doesn't have to say anything if he doesn't want to, but this is the Mu he will be assigned to for the foreseeable future. Mu are half-human at best, but that human half means kindness and a firm hand goes a long way in training the violence out of them. The seminar on Mu-human interaction said so.

The Victor Mu, on the other hand…

Kayvan rubs the bracelet on his left wrist. This thing really is unnecessary.

"Hello, CR-04. I'm Kayvan Mettius, your new handler. What should I call you?" Kayvan asks. The Mu are only listed by their ID numbers, but many handlers give them names to make it easier to deal with them.

"Roan, if you need to," says the Mu. Kayvan expected his voice to be flat, as emotionless as the walls and impersonal as his ID number, but it's rather warm and familiar instead. It's a voice he can imagine on one of his friends, or even a random stranger he might meet at a coffee shop.

Kayvan inwardly laughs at his name, though. Roan's hair is muted auburn in color, thus the name. Apparently, whoever gave him that name was not the most creative person to walk through these walls.

"Can I call you Kayvan?" Roan asks after a few empty seconds.

Kayvan blinks curiously.

He sounds polite, cultured, even. His voice is certainly accented with the Capitol's dialect, but the wording is straightforward enough to startle Kayvan. Expectations aside, Capitol Mu are supposed to be more docile than their District-born brethren. A proper upbringing is absolutely necessary to ensure a Mu's cooperation and obedience, after all.

No one in the room moves while he composes himself, not even his colleague behind him.

"Yes, certainly. You can call me Kayvan, Roan." Trying out the Mu's name, Kayvan feels incredibly silly. Roan is a lackluster name, really.

Kayvan pretends to glance at the time flashing on the walls above each cell door outside. His colleague gave them enough time for him to speak to his assigned Mu for a few minutes, but he has no idea what else they could discuss.

"I suppose we can talk later on the train. It's almost time to go."

The Mu walks over to the shelf on the east wall of his cell and takes a thin metal chain off the shelf. A small, rounded metal disk with the Capitol's logo stamped on it dangles from the end. Kayvan remembers seeing an image of it in a presentation when he was struggling to get through the schooling necessary to even pass the initial applications to this place.

The disk is a suppressor. It won't prevent the stronger Mu from using their powers and it can be taken on and off easily just like Roan is currently doing, but it puts the citizens at ease. That's the most important part. The Capitol regulates and spearheads the struggle against the Mu. If they lose control, it'll mean chaos.

Roan switches the suppressor on, then leaves it to hang off his neck in clear view before walking over and nodding for Kayvan to lead the way out.

* * *

 **Background Information:**

 _This information was originally intended to brief the submitters on the situation at hand in this AU. I have left it up in case anyone wants to read a condensed version of the reasoning behind the plot, but most of it should come up throughout the story if you prefer to learn it that way._

The Capitol and Districts have united against a common foe: the Mu, evolved humans with psychic abilities. According to scientists, their aim is to wipe out and replace humanity with their own kind. The Capitol now runs Hunger Games featuring only Mu. The Capitol and Districts still live with the same disparities of wealth from canon, but the very real danger that the Mu represent has taken top priority. Tensions still run high, but there is far less rebellion these days, at least from the average District citizens.

The catch is that Mu aren't evolved humans at all. Advances in genetic engineering led to the creation of a 'Mu factor' that gives a person psychic abilities (it's not real science, just go with it). Tired of the Districts rebelling every few decades, the Capitol used this discovery to create a common enemy.

 _-How do tributes get the Mu factor?_

Mu can give other Mu a weaker version of their abilities (though they're still powerful enough). The Capitol sends out Capitol-born Mu, all loyal to the Capitol, to give random babies the Mu factor during mandatory infant vaccinations that occur at the same time as the reapings. This way, they know how many tributes they will 'discover' in any given year.

 _-How do the reapings work?_

Reapings are performed under the guise of weeding out the Mu from the population. The Capitol claims their abilities manifest from age 12 to 18. The reaping is performed using a large metal scanner.

Mu abilities can actually manifest a little earlier or later. Any Mu discovered outside the 12-18 range are killed in an 'accident' which is covered up.

Some tributes do not realize they are Mu until the reapings.

Other tributes "successfully" hide their abilities. I say "successfully" because the screening is rigged to overlook some Mu during the reapings to give credibility to the "abilities manifest from age 12 to 18" thing.


	2. Intro, Silence

**Union of the Stars: The 220th Hunger Games**

 _Kayvan, newly minted Mu handler, and his charge are en route to their first assignment: containment duty in District 10's reaping. Along the way, Kayvan learns a bit more about Roan, the red type Capitol Mu he is responsible for from here on out._

* * *

 _Train #281_

 _Departure from: The Capitol_

 _En route to: District 10_

Kayvan quickly discovers that Roan is quiet, and disturbingly so. His silence is almost like the silence of an avox, except Roan can speak and instead chooses to stare blankly out the window the entire time. The emptiness of thought and emotion in his expression is a stark reminder that no matter how much he appears and sounds like an average young man, Roan is a Mu and Mu are not human. Perhaps they evolved from humanity, but now they are considered an entirely different species.

But Kayvan _is_ human. A human from the Capitol. He is accustomed to noise, lights, and music that vibrate with life and stream out of every crevice of the city he calls home. Studying was so difficult for him because he couldn't concentrate with people talking and playing music all around him, but he couldn't sit still without it, either.

It presses against him now, a physical force compressing against his ears insistently. The sound of the train passing over the tracks is near silent thanks to modern technology, giving him nothing to focus on except the Mu sitting across from him. He fidgets, tapping out the theme song to his favorite drama and even making an attempt to hum it, but he quickly grows bored.

The train is heading south, set on course for District 10. It will keep going without a single stopover until it reaches its destination down the mountains, across rivers and plains, and across the very continent of Panem itself.

They will arrive in Ten on schedule for the reaping of the 220th Hunger Games. The rest of the personnel on the train are all riding along for that purpose. Escorts, the Victor Mu who act as mentors, camera crews, several groups of Peacekeepers for security, as well as other Mu handlers with their charges. Everyone is here for the same reason.

None of that helps Kayvan's current situation.

There is nothing Kayvan can speak to Roan about to break the silence. He doubts the Mu wants to or is even capable of talking about fashion, music, TV programs, or last year's Games. He never asked if they even allow the Mu to watch the Hunger Games. Seeing their own kind kill each other could be considered a negative influence. Capitol Mu are docile, but that is only because it's possible to detect them at younger ages than the District-born Mu and training starts early.

Dread pools in his stomach when he thinks of the consequences of letting the Mu, even one as mild as Roan, watch the Games.

Finally, when the silence is so harsh that Kayvan is convinced he is going to scream if he doesn't hear anything aside from his own thoughts, he leans forward and fixes his eyes on Roan. It's worth a try at least.

"How exactly does your containment job work? I know your abilities let you amplify the performance of the psion suppressors, but how do you do it? The books don't describe the process, at least not the ones I've read. And you can probably explain it better than those stuffy papers and reports."

There. That should force him to give a decently long answer.

However, Roan frowns and narrows his eyes, lips still pressed together. It takes a full two minutes for him to respond.

"I…do not really know how I do it," he admits. He also lifts his eyes to stare over the top of Kayvan's left shoulder as he speaks.

It's a habit engrained in all Capitol Mu since childhood because it's easier to read a person's mind when maintaining direct eye contact, apparently. Having them concentrate on a different spot during a conversation is just another precaution taken to keep everyone safe. All Mu can read minds, after all. It's easily one of the more disturbing abilities they possess.

Well, short of the select few strong enough to crush a person's heart without even touching them.

Kayvan takes a deep breath. Despite the lackluster content of the response, Roan's voice is still the same as it was earlier. Warm, not quite intimate or even friendly, but not standoffish or distant, either.

"Is it difficult to do? Or easy?" Kayvan prompts him.

"Easy. Because I specialize in amplification, it's easy for me." Roan's incredibly stiff posture relaxes to the point that he almost looks normal.

Kayvan remembers the instructional videos they watched during class. The reaping is a huge, nationwide event that gathers together not only every citizen in each District, but also the rogue Mu that have yet to be detected. The only way to ensure the citizens' safety is to maintain an equally large suppression field. He never imagined it to be an easy job; Roan is just one small, human-shaped body against at least a few tens of thousands.

"I see," he nods. No point in questioning his abilities. Roan has been assigned this work since he was sixteen. "Do you have to know how the suppressors work in order to amplify them?"

"Not…really. Just the basics. I think about the result I desire and concentrate, and it happens."

Normally, one would shrug to express their uncertainty here. Kayvan would. But Roan does nothing except continue to stare at that point just to the left of Kayvan's shoulder. He blinks, but it is painfully slow when he does.

"If you are worried about my proficiency, there should be records in my files–"

"I read it," Kayvan says, voice rising sharply. He read it a grand total of twenty times, in fact. Over and over again, just in case.

"Sorry." Roan quiets down with a flat, quite insincere apology, and Kayvan wonders if he should bother to rebuke him. On one hand, he shouldn't be allowed such disrespect. On the other hand, he might be in a foul mood today. They recommend that handlers not push their charges _too_ hard. Mu might not be human, but like other animals, they do have off days.

Besides, Roan's file indicates that he hasn't seen any fieldwork since his last handler quit two months ago, so perhaps it's a case of going stir-crazy. Who knew Mu could be as testy as humans?

However, they are back to silence now, as a result of the lapse in the conversation.

Capitol trains are the fastest they have ever been, but it still takes quite a while to reach the outer Districts. Kayvan sighs and taps at his tablet, flipping through Roan's file for the _twenty-first_ time since he received the thing.

There isn't much to read. One page is enough space to summarize a Mu's entire life.

Roan is just above the average in every aspect except physical fitness and capability. The most interesting thing on his page is the score that indicates he is healthier than most Capitol-born Mu.

Kayvan never took the science-oriented classes, so he has no idea why this is, but the raw psionic potential of the Capitol-born Mu tends to be stronger than District-born Mu. Most chalk it up to a fundamental difference between people in the Capitol and the Districts, which is a given. Everyone knows that. The curious thing is that Capitol-born Mu tend to have weaker bodies, up to and including various vision, hearing, and speech impairments.

The file says that Roan is prone to ammonia, so he shouldn't be left operating out in the rain for too long. But other than a minor weakness in his lungs and below average physical stats, he is healthy.

Humming as he reads the file again, Kayvan looks up to ask Roan the one thing that isn't written there.

"Roan. What was it like growing up? You were born in the Capitol and brought to the facility when you were young, right?"

Capitol Mu can generally be detected in infancy due to their stronger psionic wave patterns, but the powers themselves don't manifest until later, around the same age as District-born Mu. Kayvan knows that they undergo training of some sort to make them safe for humans to handle, but little else.

"I was born in the Capitol, but I lack many memories from my childhood until my powers manifested," Roan explains. His eyes narrow a bit in concentration. "As far as I know, I was raised in the facility with the other Mu in my age bracket."

Kayvan frowns. That is certainly strange. Memory loss seems like a big deal, something that should be in his file. But maybe no one has asked him this question before to find out.

"What did they teach you?" Kayvan asks next, leaning forward eagerly. He figures that he's lucky for getting that much out of him already.

"How to control our abilities," Roan provides succinctly. He says nothing more.

Kayvan leans back with a huff. He had thought that, despite being nonhuman, a Mu would at least have enough social graces to hold a conversation. Apparently, he was hoping for too much. The Victors, of course, have plenty of personality. But Kayvan needs at least another decade of experience before he can work with them. For now, he's stuck with Roan.

Time passes and the two occupants keep to themselves.

Eventually, however, Kayvan can't stand the quiet. He used up an hour tapping out emails and answering his friends' phone calls, but when he has exhausted those forms of entertainment, he is back to staring at the Mu in front of him.

"What does it feel like to…" Kayvan hesitates. Even thinking of this could be considered dangerous, but he has wondered ever since he started learning how to be a Mu handler. "What does it feel like to read someone else's mind?"

However, Roan simply blinks and looks down at his hands. His fingers are perfectly aligned, curled slightly like a cat elegantly lounging in a windowsill.

"It feels like when I speak with you," he says. Kayvan frowns at that answer. "Only, my throat hurts less."

Kayvan straightens in his seat, a thin stream of adrenaline coursing through his veins like fire. This is the first time he has volunteered information that Kayvan didn't have to pry out of him, and it's a complaint to boot. He doesn't seem sick; his cheeks are pale, not overly flushed, and his eyes are clear and focused. His voice doesn't waver, either.

"Are you ill? You should have said something earlier. Your file says you're prone to sickness, and they predict it will be cloudy and overcast in District 10. You really need to tell me these things ahead of time. I know you're a Mu, not a human, but communication is of utmost importance in–"

Roan leans away as if retreating from an approaching hand even though Kayvan isn't anywhere close enough to touch him. How odd.

"That's not." He pauses. "I'm not sick."

He emphasizes the word 'sick' in a way that startles Kayvan. That isn't a Capitol accent; it's more like one of the middle Districts'. Every other word was spoken in his normal, warm voice that contrasts so much with his stiff posture, except for that word.

"Then what are you?"

"I'm not used to talking so much," Roan says.

Kayvan just notices that he has been swallowing an awful lot for someone who hasn't been drinking water.

"Oh," Kayvan says, feeling silly. Of course, most people would feel as Kayvan felt earlier, so this would never normally come up. What is there to talk to a Mu about? They don't exactly make for great conversationalists. If Kayvan wasn't so bored, he wouldn't even have tried. "Sorry, then."

"You don't need to apologize," Roan says. "If you have questions, it is best that you ask them now while we have time."

That's one of the rules. No talking to the Mu in public. It would be dangerous if some impressionable citizen got it into their heads that talking to all Mu is as safe as talking to trained Capitol Mu, or even the Victors. The only talking they are allowed is anything pertaining to their job.

"Right. So, District 10." Roan's file says that he has never been assigned there. Last year, it was to District 12. "I think District 10 is a lot nicer than Twelve. I've never been to any of the Districts, actually, but it looks a lot less gloomy in the videos."

Roan nods politely. "The air was dusty in Twelve."

"It'll be dusty in Ten, too," Kayvan points out. He pauses. "Twelve is more sooty than dusty, though…"

Roan has nothing to say to that. And, honestly, neither does Kayvan.

Right. This isn't working. Kayvan does not want to spend the rest of the train ride comparing the air quality in Twelve to Ten.

Roan goes back to staring out the window, leaving Kayvan to wallow in the silence alone.

* * *

I see people ask questions at the end of chapters often and thought it would be fun. You don't have to answer them, as there is no sponsorship system (well, in the story there is, of course).

 **What do you think of Kayvan and Roan? What role do you think they play in all this?**


	3. Intro, Containment Duty

**Union of the Stars: The 220th Hunger Games**

 _Kayvan and Roan disembark in District 10 and begin the important job of suppressing the psionic abilities of every Mu in the area._

* * *

 _District 10_

Time Until Reaping: 1 hour, 45 minutes

The air in District 10 is scented with a curious combination of dust, sweet hay, and the sort of must that grows in closets without air fresheners. It sweeps across the flat expanse of land without trees, mountains, or even tall buildings to stop it. Kayvan sneezed as soon as he stepped off the train, making him wish that he could wear whatever he wants, like the escorts are free to do. Then he could have worn a scarf to cover his nose and mouth. Instead, he is stuck wearing a drab Capitol-issued work uniform.

At least it's better than the plain grey outfit edged in an awfully vibrant shade of red that Roan has to wear to distinguish himself as a Mu. The people from Ten who live and work in the shops nearby eye the Mu in their distinctive clothes warily as they progress through town.

If Kayvan remembers correctly, District 10 has had quite a few rogue Mu go on destructive rampages over the years. The Capitol even launched an investigation to determine why one of the least populated Districts was producing so many rogue Mu.

Nothing ever came of it, as far as Kayvan remembers. It explains the citizens' unease, though. Several mothers pull their children behind them, just in case one of the Mu decide to lunge at them like wild animals.

Something pressing up against his side draws his attention away from the procession in front of them. Turning with a slight frown, he finds that it's only Roan leaning away from a set of avoxes coming through the crowd carrying a heavy-looking desk. He eyes the object warily for some reason, as if it might jump up and bite him.

They pass and Roan quickly falls into step behind Kayvan without even a glance at his handler. No apology, either.

Kayvan guesses that they are halfway to their destination when he hears a shout from somewhere behind him. Whirling around, his heart speeding up in anticipation of using the weapon tucked into his belt, he turns and sees a truly wild sight. A sight he could never have seen from the comfort of his home in the Capitol.

"You did that on purpose!" says a deep, gravelly voice filled with fear. A large man of approximately fifty years holds a black stick of some sort in one trembling hand. He brandishes it at Roan, who stands with two feet between them and a bowed head.

Kayvan starts forward, a protest on his lips, when he hears the people around them whispering urgently.

"Someone stop him before he gets himself killed!"

"Not again…"

"Isn't anyone going to stop it? Or are the Peacekeepers saving their own hides…"

Kayvan urges his feet to move. He shuffles over to Roan, who glances up at him with an unreadable expression in his eyes.

"Don't!" the man shouts, waving the stick in Roan's direction.

In that instant, Kayvan wonders if Capitol Mu are anything like their District counterparts. Maybe they are different species. He has seen a fourteen-year-old girl use a raw blast of psionic energy to rip a gaping wound in her opponent's side. The older, stronger Mu can even stop a weaker Mu's heart without touching them.

But Roan does not move an inch when he clearly sees the man take a swing at him, and Kayvan suspects it's not because he believes the man won't hit him.

Kayvan grabs Roan's wrist and yanks him out of the way. Roan's thin body collides against him as they both stumble back a few steps. The man gives a surprised shout and whirls around, freezing when he spots Kayvan's distinctive uniform marking him as a Capitol worker.

"Hey-"

Kayvan's words die on his lips. His training covered what they should and should not say in public. He grips Roan's wrist tighter and yanks him so he stands behind Kayvan.

"I'll take care of it," Kayvan says stiffly. "I'm his handler."

An apology isn't necessary. The people don't want to hear platitudes; they want action. Kayvan keeps his eyes narrowed and lips pressed into a tense line as he turns around, roughly pushing Roan into a walk.

But, Kayvan has no intention of punishing him. What did they do but bump into each other? If Roan really intended on hurting the man, they would likely be standing in a puddle of blood by now. He didn't even feel a spark or a slight itchiness to indicate that Roan was going to use his powers back there, as people often report feeling when a Mu activates their abilities.

Roan steals a glance at him as they fall into the crowd of personnel, but he doesn't initiate a conversation, not even to ask if he is in trouble.

* * *

Several low platforms stand at various locations around town. Kayvan supposes the citizens must use them as gathering spots during the rest of the year, but during the reaping, teams of avoxes transform the platforms into stations.

Half of the machinery is already set up, including the wires that run from the platform and join the next one somewhere a few blocks down the street. Kayvan breathes a low whistle at the sight of its dark steel exterior and the computer terminals flashing on standby.

Eventually they are shuffled into place, each given a chair at one of the long desks that has been hauled up on the platform. Kayvan receives a pair of headphones with a little microphone attached. The device connects him to Roan, who sits uncomfortably at his side.

Kayvan watched the entire time as they hooked Roan up to several wires. He is wearing a matching pair of headphones in addition to several electrodes taped to his face, hands, and chest beneath his shirt. The pendant-type suppressor he was wearing is tucked away in Kayvan's pocket.

One of the technicians, a woman around the same age as Kayvan's mother, snaps her fingers in his face and instructs him to face forward.

"I know what to do," Kayvan says as she starts to explain which button is which, and what each number on the screen reads.

"The last person who said that just sat there and stared at the screen the whole time," the woman snaps. Her accent is distinctly Capitol, but Kayvan has never heard such harsh words come out of his mother's mouth. He almost wouldn't believe it if not for the thickness of her accent. "Now, you are going to read these numbers out loud. Don't bother repeating them, just make sure you don't read them wrong the first time. And these, here…"

The explanation takes a good ten minutes and each handler at this station receives the same lecture. When the technicians are done, they move away from the platform.

"It's like this every year," a woman nearby drawls as she picks at her manicured nails. She turns around to wave at one of the other handlers. "Just because the newbies don't know how to tell left from right, they have to put us through this torture. Seriously?"

Kayvan turns his head to face the screen and slowly inches down in his seat. They aren't talking about him, specifically, but…

A light brush of skin against his knuckles makes him jolt in his seat. Kayvan stares at Roan, who is pretending that he hadn't just broken a rule by making contact with his handler. No matter how long he focuses on the Mu, however, Roan keeps on looking forward with a blank stare like he is supposed to.

Sighing, Kayvan turns around and waits for the signal to start.

When he hears the announcements around town informing people that the reaping will begin promptly in thirty minutes, it means that it's finally time to start speaking the first string of numbers.

"One-one-five-two-nine point zero-four-two." All around him, handlers are speaking in low voices to the Mu sitting next to them. Glancing at Roan out of the corner of his eye, Kayvan finally gets the opportunity to see a Mu's amplification powers at work.

The areas around the electrodes glow faint red, a sort of energy byproduct that Kayvan doesn't totally understand the science behind. Roan's eyes are closed in concentration, his lips parted slightly as he channels psion waves into the machines they hooked him up to earlier.

Kayvan is simply reading the precise coordinates and adjustments for him. He doesn't know how the numbers help Roan amplify the suppressors when he only understands the 'basics' of how these machines work, but this is what they instructed Kayvan to do. Apparently, it's necessary.

The psion suppressors are built into the electrical wiring of the town and District, but they are too costly to run at full power all the time. During the reaping, Mu like Roan are required to keep it running for the event. If it wasn't necessary, they wouldn't bother sending this many people out to sit around and do nothing.

As more time passes, Kayvan realizes just how easy his job actually is. He has a few chances to pause and catch his breath while Roan breathes heavily next to him.

Just after the District 10 mayor finishes her speech, Roan cringes in the seat next to Kayvan. Sweat rolls down his brow and he grinds his teeth together in pain, but he doesn't stop or even ask for a break.

Kayvan reads the next string of digits and tries to ignore the reddish glow emitting from every Mu in the vicinity. There is no other sign of their abilities at work, even though the large metal dishes emitting waves across the town hum and whirl on either side of the platform.

And he tries not to wonder just how he expected the one next to him to attack him the second they met.

Then, he hears something whisper at the edges of his awareness. At first, he thinks it must be the wind slipping through the headphones. Then, he hears it again, and it sinks in like a rapid series of vibrations against his skull. Kayan winces.

 _"Don't worry,_ " says a familiar voice, after the vibrations begin to subside.

The voice spreads throughout his head, clear with a warm, reassuring tone, but it doesn't come from anywhere. It originates from within, as if the words themselves have been transferred directly to his brain, completely bypassing his ears in the process.

" _Just concentrate on the numbers. I'm fine._ "

He opens his mouth, but a wave of urgency makes him finish the motion with a large inhale instead.

" _Don't worry, Kayvan. It's easy, remember?_ "

Is he supposed to be doing this? Kayvan can't quite recall the rules. He knows that Mu aren't supposed to speak to their handlers on the job, but he doesn't remember if speaking telepathically counts.

" _It's okay. Stay calm and keep reading the numbers to me. I can't read them off and use this much power at once._ "

Roan is sort of talkative, in his head at least. Kayvan still has no idea if his exact words are reaching Roan, but he does receive a soft, rumbling laugh in response, so he figures that it's working.

 _We'll talk about this later,_ Kayvan thinks.

Then he says the next string: "Seven-zero-nine-two point zero-zero-five-three."

And the next, and the next after that.

* * *

Have you ever used bone conduction headphones? I've heard that they don't work well when listening to music because they send strong vibrations through your head, but I've used ones from an audiologist's office before. You hear a tone/beep through them, same as regular hearing tests, but instead of hearing through your ears, the sound goes straight through to your head (and it's an extremely clear sound, too). It's...slightly bizarre, and what I based this telepathy thing off of.

 **Do you think Roan is going to get in trouble for talking to Kayvan telepathically?**


	4. The Reaping, District 4

**Union of the Stars: The 220th Hunger Games**

 _Life in District 4 is life on the water's surface: no matter how many ripples form, the ocean returns to how it has always been and always will be. The reaping, too, comes and goes with the tide._

* * *

 **District 4**

 _Bianca Transom_

 _Age: 15_

 _7:10 AM_

The morning of a reaping is still a busy one for people like Bianca and her family.

A cool breeze whips up from the water's surface to the Transom family's little shipyard located at the edge of a large inlet. The inlet is crested with tall, brambly grasses and rocky sands, looping around and rejoining the sea. Several other families work along these waters, but even Bianca can't see them from her position atop one of the boats undergoing repairs.

Bianca inhales a deep breath, tasting the familiar sting of salt that dries out the skin and everything else it touches. As she rocks in time with the boat bobbing up and down in the steady waters, she turns her head out to the sea on the horizon and wonders what it might feel like to ride on the winds across those waters. To fly out as if on the fine, pointed wings of a gull, rather than the slow crawl of a boat.

The wind whistles in her ears, carrying brief whispers of her brother and father's voices up from below. If she is lucky, it won't be strong enough to kick up the sand and trap the fine grains in her long, curly brown hair. She does tie it up while she works up here, but sand gets in it anyway. Sand tends to get everywhere by the end of the day.

However, it's still early. The sun rose a few hours ago, but the air above the water is chilly, sneaking beneath her sleeves like the little snakes that slither among the rocks.

Her brother, Ford, was nearly stung by one once when Bianca was seven and just learning how to repair a ship's hull. After that incident, her father had given her a long stick of driftwood to prod the low-laying bushes and brambles with for snakes. Bianca hadn't minded it as much as Ford did. She swung it around and pretended to go fishing with it, according to her father and brother.

"…ca!"

Bianca straightens upon hearing her name. She carefully leans over the edge of the boat to see her brother waving at her from below.

"What?" she calls out. Ford answers, but she strains to hear his answer over the wind and crash of the water against the ship's hull. "What'd you say?"

Her brother's voice reaches her in bits and pieces, but she fills in the rest easily enough.

"I said, there is someone down here to see you!"

That's strange.

"Okay! I'll be right down!"

Bianca's friends always agree to meet up somewhere in town for the reaping. They rarely ever visit each other's houses seeing as most of them are scattered up and down the coast, or somewhere in the winding streets of the town. Bianca never invites anyone to her place. She'll go if someone asks her along, of course, but she has never once invited anyone over.

By the time she is back on dry land, her brother has wandered off.

Bianca first searches the workshop where her father is sawing several new masts for the largest ship in the yard. She ducks out without greeting him.

She goes to the back porch next and huffs when she peeks inside the house, finding nothing but their worn and wind-beaten furniture. No signs of life.

Finally, she walks through the house and exits out the front door, which they rarely use. Its hinges scream as she pries it open. Ford is standing just a few yards away speaking to a boy around his age.

Bianca stares at the older boy curiously, her steps slowing as she approaches.

She has never seen him before. Or, at least she thinks she hasn't. She knows he isn't a customer, as she generally remembers their faces if not their names. But he certainly isn't a friend of hers and she doubts he is Ford's, either, if he hasn't invited him inside yet.

"Ford? What is it? Who's that?" she asks as she trots up to her brother, who glances down at her with a quirked eyebrow. She waits patiently as he pauses, then sighs and steps back so all three of them can see each other clearly.

"He says he found something you dropped back in town, but when he tried to stop you and give it back, you didn't hear him and kept walking. Sounds just like the Bianca I know, am I right?" Ford says with a teasing huff. Bianca frowns at him, though she can't really argue.

This older boy is quite a bit taller than her, but not quite as tall as Ford, perhaps an inch or two shorter than her brother's nearly six-foot-tall frame. The boy's hair is a warm shade of red, which reminds her of a setting sun, arranged in light curls around his face.

Bianca's gaze switches to focus on the notebook in his hands rather than his face so she doesn't space out too much. It's easy to get carried away, to lose herself in thoughts of what sort of person he might be. Where he works in the District, the friends he has, that sort of thing. Bianca does that a lot, when she gets the chance.

The boy hands her the notebook after a moment of dead silence. Bianca takes it, flipping it open roughly to the center to see the little doodles in the margins of her notes for math class. There are a lot of those doodles, most made in plain grey pencil lead, but a few are colorful designs she used a special set of pens to draw.

A warm cloud of relieved joy expands in her chest as she browses the pages, a smile growing on her face. She could really care less about the math notes, but the drawings are irreplaceable. They're always little things that dawn on her in the middle of class. Snippets of ongoing stories she crafts in her head over the course of days, weeks, or even months. The latest one features the cat she sees in the schoolyard every single day. She drew a whole page of the cat's adventures, where she thought it might go when not at school, what sort of animals it meets along the way.

"Thank you! I thought I'd never see this again…" She hugs it close and smiles up at the stranger.

"It's no problem," says the older boy. His eyes stare, uncomfortably steady, into hers. They are a dark, dark brown somewhat like her own. "I thought it would be a shame if it someone threw it out. They seem quite precious to you."

Bianca nods vigorously.

"Thanks again," Ford says on her behalf. He smiles sheepishly. "And sorry that you had to go through all the trouble of coming out here. How'd you find us, anyway? We're sort of out in the middle of nowhere."

"I asked around town to see if a Bianca lived nearby. It took a few tries, but eventually I found out this is the place." The older boy smiles again, turning to Bianca with a wave. "Try not to lose it again."

It seems a shame that he's going to leave. Bianca ducks her head as Ford asks him for his opinion on some event the older kids are participating in at school. His presence here isn't much in the way of excitement, but not much really goes on around District 4 in the first place. No one just randomly shows up to say hi, or to return lost items, or to do anything but to ask her father to fix their ships.

"I'll see you at the reaping, then?" Ford asks, apparently already friends with this guy. The older boy nods and agrees to meet them by the old bakery in town in an hour and a half. Ford turns to Bianca and prods her in the back with his hand. "Thank Arven one more time, Bianca. He lives on the other side of town and decided to come all the way here just to give you back something _you_ lost."

Bianca fights the urge to stick her tongue out at her brother. She settles for giving him a glare before turning back to Arven.

"Thanks," she says, "again."

Arven laughs. It's slightly stiff, like he is just getting over a cold.

"It's fine, you don't need to thank me. It's nice to go out for a walk every now and again anyway."

Bianca nods, agreeing. When she has nothing to do around the yard, her father and brother doing work that she is still too young to help with, she often goes for walks around the shore and lets her mind wander.

Arven leaves soon after, promising to see them at the reaping.

"Do you know him from school?" Bianca asks Ford as they walk back to the house.

"No, I don't remember seeing him around. He might go to the school across town, though, so maybe we'll see him at the sports competition in a few months. I mean, he seemed confused when I asked if he liked to play foot ball, but I think he's the type to show up. Team spirit and all, you know?"

Bianca nods absently, stopping inside to put her notebook on the coffee table before rejoining her brother outside.

Their father wants them to work a bit more on the ship that her friend Nadia's family brought in a few days ago. Without that ship, they won't be able to work. She has seen Nadia looking sullen about it yesterday, but there isn't much Bianca can do except give her some space. Her father and brother can only work so fast, after all.

After they work on as much as they can, they'll all get cleaned up and go to the reaping. Bianca can't wait to flip through her notebook and get reacquainted with all the drawings she thought were lost forever, but they'll just have to wait.

* * *

 _Arven Maddox_

 _Age: 18_

 _7:55 AM_

Arven wanders along the outskirts of District 4's winding town by the sea. He wrinkles his nose at the pungent scent of stagnant water pooling in the crevices and gutters between alleyways. Rats and mice skitter across the stones and dart between crates filled with the smell of wood rot. For a town that is known for producing fish, however, the air isn't filled with the scent of the sea so much as it is the odor of fresh and rotting trash.

As he walks down the alleys, he can hear the sounds of people in the streets. Most of them are grumbling about tax increases and more wasted days watching monsters kill each other on live TV. He hears a baby cry out and a mother hush her back to sleep before turning to her friends, worrying about the so-called 'signs of a Mu baby' that has been going around magazines from the Capitol recently.

How ridiculous.

He scoffs, kicking at a loose stone in the road. It spins rapidly as it flies across the ground before shattering against the stones a few feet away, courtesy of Arven's psion waves sending enough force into it to make it crumble into a powdery dust.

Arven ducks into a side street behind a row of carpenters' shops and winces at the volume of the machines hacking away. The screeching drowns out the townspeople's gossip, though, and more importantly, no one really takes a leisurely walk back here. Not even the girl he met at the repair shop would bother coming this far for a walk.

Arven senses more than he hears the footsteps approaching him from the side. It's a vague sense, like two people brushing against each other's sleeves, barely touching.

"How did it go?" asks a familiar voice. Arven tilts his head to the side as he continues to walk.

"Fine. Stila, where were you? You were supposed to meet me at the corner."

Stila shakes her head, short black hair swishing.

"I don't like wandering around town like you do. It's bad enough that we have to meet back here, of all places. I know, I know! It's safer this way. But it reeks and it's filthy and I swear I saw a rat the size of a dog back there."

No matter what, Arven can't stop thinking of her as unnecessarily dramatic. Still, the familiarity is nice, so he listens to her rambling about her close encounter with a 'mutant rat'. None of what she says is important, but her chatter is something to focus on aside from the noise.

"So, so, is she one of us?" Stila asks under her breath, though most of the words are drowned out by the machines around them. Arven hears it telepathically more than he does with his ears. "Like you thought?"

Arven recalls when he picked up that notebook. Originally, he had only meant to pick it up and throw it out to make room because he wanted to sit there. However, a single touch had sent a small ripple through his senses. The faint, colorful, aimless thoughts attached to that notebook were what caught his attention. Normal objects can retain residual emotions for a short amount of time, so he held onto it for the rest of the day just to make sure. And the longer he held onto it, the more he realized that its owner was like them.

"I believe so. But she hasn't become aware of it yet." Arven had skimmed her thoughts and that of her brother. Neither of them were hiding anything important. "And her thoughts are…scattered, at best. Aimless. A bit like yours."

"Hey! I'm not air-headed!" Stila protests, going to kick him in the shin.

"I didn't say you were…" Arven winces, shoving her away as his skin smarts with pain. Well, that's a bruise that won't heal for another three weeks. If he makes it that long.

"But the scanners will pick her up, is what you're saying," Stila says glumly.

Arven nods. "I'm meeting them at a bakery later. Don't come."

"As if I'd want to meet your new friends," Stila comments, though her words have no heat to them.

* * *

 _Bianca Transom_

 _8:30 AM_

Bianca wanders up and down the street as they wait for Arven to meet them at the corner. She managed to stay still for a few minutes, but ended up wandering away to browse the shops and stare at all the stuff they can't afford.

It doesn't actually bother her that much, though. Even if she can't have them, she can imagine herself wearing the pretty orange dress in the window for a special occasion. She imagines the stories she could draw in fresh ink on pristine white paper if they had the money.

For everything except food, the images her mind spins together is more than enough.

By the time she makes her way back to the bakery, a dozen ideas have filtered through her mind and out again. She takes her eyes off the display of cakes and golden pastries shaped like goldfish to see Ford talking animatedly to Arven. The boy is smiling and nodding along with whatever Ford is saying.

Bianca walks up to her brother's side and waits, gazing across the street to see if she can spot anyone familiar. It's a bit doubtful with the crowd growing as big as it is, but Lacie does live around here with her extended family. They're a little difficult to miss, numbering thirteen including Lacie's parents, siblings grandparents, and cousins.

Sometimes Bianca thinks it must be nice to be part of such a large family, to fade into the background and watch everyone laugh and cry together.

"Hello again." Arven directs the greeting in Bianca's direction, startling her.

She turns to him and smiles, waving. She honestly didn't expect him to say anything. Most of the time, her brother's friends just ignore her. Though she doesn't really know if Arven counts as one if he only met them because he wanted to give her back her notebook.

Ford nudges her in the shoulder.

"We should get going, I guess."

"Are you nervous?" Arven asks, leaning down slightly to address Bianca.

She shakes her head. Of course not. "No, I-"

"Nah, she's just quiet," Ford speaks over her, making her frown.

"I'm not nervous," Bianca states firmly. "I'm not a Mu. Why would I be nervous?"

Arven stares at her as if he's saying, _If you're sure._

Ford scoffs at the other boy, doing a bad job at suppressing a grin.

"Are _you_ nervous?"

"No," Arven answers, his lips twitching a bit as if he's having trouble maintaining a polite smile. Bianca studies him closely, wondering what reason he has to be nervous. "I know the detectors are really accurate, but what if one of them makes a mistake and it identifies someone who isn't a Mu? That happens with machines sometimes."

"Oh, don't worry about _that_!" Ford laughs, patting Arven on the back. "It's been _years_ since the Games started having Mu in them and every single year it's Mu who go into the Games! They haven't made a mistake and accidentally sent a normal person in yet."

It's been fifty years, Bianca corrects him in her head, though not out loud.

She ends up tuning the rest of the conversation out, Arven's novelty mostly worn off by now. There are more interesting things to think about than how machines work.

* * *

 _Bianca Transom_

 _8:55 AM_

District 4's escort for this year, Maribelle, is a gaudily dressed woman who tries to match the theme of whatever District she is assigned each year. Last year, Bianca remembers that she had Twelve, which was a bit of a challenge. Bianca still can't think of any other outfit that would have fit better than that black dress with an odd sort of cloud motif sewed on it.

This year, however, Maribelle is actually quite pretty except for the patchy array of shiny scales on her face. Bianca watches her dress flow and swirl in the breeze, each layer light as a feather and as iridescent as a seashell. Little milky white pearls dangle off the sleeves of her dress and, of course, from her necklace.

Bianca passed through the gate without a single hesitation, and now she stands amongst her friends waiting for the event to end. It's slightly frightening when they call people up and someone from the crowd starts screaming, but the entire thing doesn't last long.

Maribelle stands at the podium, completely unfazed by both the two Victor Mu sitting behind her and the nervous shifting of the youngest kids in the front. Bianca doesn't know how people from the Capitol can be so oblivious. Mu are _dangerous_. They watch them kill each other with just their minds on TV every year. The two Mu sitting behind Maribelle probably have a ton of kills each. Bianca wonders just what goes on in the escorts' heads to want that job. They seem pretty happy to be doing it, too, as long as they aren't stuck somewhere like Twelve.

"Welcome, everybody! I am so, so happy to be here in District 4 this year!" Maribelle blows them a kiss and smiles brightly against their sullen or achingly bored stares. "After that riveting speech from your mayor, please allow me to announce the results of the Mu detector's scans so that we may get right along with the 220th Hunger Games!"

All around her, Bianca's friends are muttering for her to get on with the reaping. Bianca doesn't care much, herself. It'll be over soon. She thinks back to her brother's new friend, who turned out to be more boring than she thought. But she is grateful that he bothered to give her notebook back at all.

"Ooh, looks like we have two this year!" Maribelle is holding two slips of paper, two white strips of paper that hold the names of two Mu disguising themselves as human.

It's creepy, if Bianca thinks about it. The Mu look so normal until they get into the Games. Monsters in human skins, like a nightmare out of a fairytale.

"Let's be polite, shall we?" Maribelle giggles, mostly to herself and the audience back in the Capitol.

They aren't the ones who have to live with the Mu hidden amongst them, after all.

"Ladies first!"

Maribelle unfolds one strip of paper, deliberately slow.

"Our tribute number one is…Bianca Transom!"

Bianca hears screams to her left and right. Confused, she emerges from her musings to see her friends scrambling to get away, their eyes wide with fear. Nadia shoves Lacie aside with a shriek and disappears into the crowd.

"B-Bianca…? Bianca is… _one of them?_ " Lacie whispers, shaking her head.

Wait, what?

Her, a Mu?

No, it has to be another Bianca. Another Bianca, not her.

Bianca shakes her head in confusion, glancing about. "No, I'm not. I'm not a Mu! I-"

She tries to back up when she hears the Peacekeepers coming for her.

This is definitely a mistake. She would have known if she was a Mu. How could she not know? Mu are dangerous creatures, with the ability to read minds and destroy things without a single touch. If she was a Mu, she would know!

Her heart pounds wildly in her chest as she looks around at the gazes of fear and disgust around her.

She takes a deep breath. It's a mistake. It's definitely a mistake. Ford was wrong. Machines make mistakes all the time, after all. All she has to do is point this out to them and ask that they rerun the test. That's all there is to it.

Yes. That is all she has to do.

With a small nod to herself, she makes her way through the crowd and walks up to the Peacekeepers. Their stark white uniforms usually fill her with a sense of security, but their cold, unfeeling stares as they herd her to the center aisle leading up to the platform makes her shiver.

However, she tries to ignore the unsettling feeling in her stomach. She isn't a Mu, after all. They just think she is one, which is why they're treating her like this.

She lets them lead her to the stage without a fuss, her head neither downturned nor lifted in confidence. She isn't going to participate in these Games, anyway. The Games are for Mu.

But, she will let them go through their whole fanfare with the reaping, at least, Then she will ask them to check again. It might take a bit for her friends to trust her and truly believe it was a false alarm, but that's okay. She can deal with that.

Bianca isn't a Mu, after all, but she is okay enduring being treated as one for a short time at least.

As she reaches the stage, Maribelle gives her a beaming grin filled with the glint of the fake scales pasted on her face. Or, at least, Bianca hopes they're fake. It would be painful if they weren't.

"Alright! What a good girl!" Maribelle says warmly. "Now, onto our second and last tribute!"

Bianca shivers. A real Mu. This one is a real Mu, unlike her. She will have to stand up there and shake a real Mu's hand.

"Arven Maddox, please come join Bianca in the spotlight!"

No. That can't be right, either. _Arven?_ The Arven they met just this morning? The same one who returned her notebook to her?

Now she's more than certain that this is just a malfunction and District 4 doesn't have any Mu to offer up this year. Both she _and_ Arven can't be Mu. Bianca isn't particularly good at math, but it's obvious.

Her mind fills with half-formed possibilities. Maybe someone rigged it. But that's impossible. Bianca had never met Arven before this morning and no one had been around to see them in the same spot.

She thinks that maybe a Mu hidden in the crowd manipulated the results somehow, but that doesn't hold up, either. The Capitol sends out entire teams to suppress the powers of any Mu in the vicinity of a reaping. No one can use their abilities here.

Maybe it's because they went through the same scanner. If it's a problem with the machine, then that is probably it.

Bianca takes a deep breath to calm her racing heart as Arven steps up beside her, glancing at her with a small, reassuring smile that Bianca returns. She is sure that they'll be able to walk out of here soon.

Soon. It'll be fine. There is no need to worry. She just has to be patient.

In front of them, Maribelle twitters on, urging the audience to keep watching the Capitol's main channel for more, exclusive footage of the Games and interviews with this year's Gamemakers.

* * *

There won't be any goodbyes for this story! It really doesn't fit with the narrative, plus it would draw everything out even more...However, we will get the tributes' thoughts on the aftermath of the reaping when it comes time to write out the train rides.

...And yes, Arven's friend Stila is indeed a Mu.

Arven Maddox belongs to myself. Bianca Transom belongs to Elim9.

 **What do you think of this District pair? Will knowing each other before the reaping help or hurt them?**


	5. The Reaping, District 2

**Union of the Stars: The 220th Hunger Games**

 **SYOT: CLOSED**

All of the spots have been filled but one! Thank you everyone who submitted! All of them were awesome and unique in their own ways. I can't wait to get to the rest of them!

For those who have reserved spots, please try to get them in soon! I have finalized the order I will post the reapings in. You can find them on my profile at the bottom. Please try to get them to me before I reach the reapings for that district.

For everyone who has a tribute in one of the last three reapings (D6, D12, D3), I will probably post their side story sooner and maybe make it a little longer than the others to compensate.

I know it's probably really confusing hopping from site to site, but this site doesn't have a blog feature. On tumblr, if you're curious, I'm posting my characters' profiles as well as lists of all the Districts' escorts and mentors (and a ton of other little ramblings).

* * *

 **District 2**

 _Galen Vikander_

 _Age: 18_

 _7:30 AM_

Galen hears his mother's muddled thoughts from the next room over and takes a deep breath before carefully sealing his mind off from hers. Her murky grumbling and the weight of her weariness and annoyance sends phantom aches through his chest as he pulls on his best clothes for the reaping. In the early morning hours, when he has just risen from sleep in the comfort of his own room, her thoughts flow into his all too easily.

If his mother had anything left in her except the bone-deep fatigue she carries with her and impresses upon him every day, she might have noticed the few mornings in which he accidentally slipped up and responded to a gripe she never said out loud. If she was still anything like the adoring mother he remembers from his childhood, she might have even noticed that he is a Mu long ago.

Galen stares into the mirror, remembering the days when his younger self would stand impatiently in this very spot as she brushed his hair for school. As a child, he always appreciated the times she would sacrifice the little luxuries in life, like sugar for her coffee or a new set of clothes, to buy him a special treat and a small toy for his birthday. It's those little moments he misses the most, however, now that they are gone.

He still loves his mother, of course. As he smooths out the collar and cuffs on the pressed white button-up shirt he ironed himself, he finds that he cannot bring himself to hate her. Perhaps he resents her just a little for the careless attitude she has these days, for her lack of concern as Galen prepares to face his last reaping. But he knows, logically, that she has no need to be concerned. Hardly anyone fears for their children on reaping day since the rules of the Games changed to persecute the Mu and the Mu alone.

She only thinks of today as a drag because she has no way of knowing what Galen has planned. She has no idea that he has already made his peace with and said goodbye to everything he holds dear in this District, except for her.

Galen takes a deep breath as he turns slightly to look out the window as the harsh amber light of dawn fades into golden-yellow and blue.

Even if she had accepted him as a Mu, even if he took the risk to tell her back when he was thirteen and horrified by the discovery of his strange powers, it's for the best that she remained ignorant all these years. Galen has no doubt that the Capitol, cruel and terrible as it is, would punish harshly a parent who willingly hid her child's status as a Mu. The whispers of ' _treason_ ' he hears at the edges of people's minds in the streets is proof enough that he never dared to tell her.

All of that will soon be behind him. He will leave her side today. Leave this little house that holds so many memories, painful and happy ones alike, and risk everything he is on the chance that he can make a difference. A small spark, equal parts hope and unease, fills his chest as he opens the door to his room and gazes back at it fondly.

In another life, he might have had a sibling to share it with if his father had lived, or his mother had remarried. In this life, however, he used that room to experiment with his psionic abilities over and over again in the dead of night. He refined and enhanced them as best he could with no knowledge of what he could even do. It must have worked for him to survive up until now.

Exiting his room, he emerges into the kitchen, which is clean and warm, although the cabinets are almost barren in contrast. Galen pulls together ingredients for a simple breakfast of oatmeal while he wonders if his mother will keep the house neat in his absence. Will she even keep it at all, or will she sell it and move into an apartment?

He hopes that she does. He hopes that she has enough strength left in her to move on after losing both her husband and only son, that she can eventually lead a normal life, which has eluded them for so many years.

Galen pushes the thought down and scoops steaming oatmeal into two bowls. His hands tremble slightly as he slides a spoon into each.

He allows himself one moment of weakness. _It's not fair. None of this is fair._ All he had ever wanted out of life was a little normalcy, a small and happy life. He never asked for anything grand or beyond his means.

After a few seconds, he stops himself from continuing any further.

"Breakfast!" he calls out as he sits down to eat from his own bowl. His mother won't emerge until much later, which is all well and fine. It's unbearable to try and hold a polite conversation when she only gives him generic answers in response.

Galen forces himself to slow down and enjoy the plain taste of the oatmeal, almost blisteringly hot on his tongue. It will be the last home cooked meal he ever eats. Victor Mu never get to return to their Districts, after all, and they would be outcasts even if they did.

Thinking about winning, however, turns his thoughts to the tributes he will have to face to make that a reality. It's almost enough to make his resolve waver.

He can't let that happen.

Galen finishes his breakfast and pauses before leaving. He turns back and enters his mother's room, where she is sitting on the bed. A crinkled blouse lays crumpled in one hand as she stares at the picture frame on the nightstand. Galen makes it a point not to read her thoughts as he leans down and wraps his arms stiffly around her back. She lifts one arm up in response, gripping his forearm, but her touch is feather-light and slides off as soon as Galen leans away.

"Bye, mom," he says, giving her the warmest smile he can manage while suppressing a surge of hollowed out sadness. "I'll see you at the reaping."

She turns to him, hesitates, and nods. "Of course. Just one more year, Galen. One more year."

"Not even," he says, shaking his head as he forces his lips to twitch upwards in a mockery of a humorous smile. "It's just one more day."

One more day and he can be free, if he so chooses. He has managed to avoid detection for all these years, after all. He can surely manage one more if he wants to.

But he has already made up his mind.

* * *

 _Genesis Arkose_

 _Age: 14_

 _8:30 AM_

It started as whispers. Little snippets of conversations. Barely audible murmurs that sounded like muffled words spoken underwater or behind a thick wall of stone.

Every now and then, Genesis would pause and worry that the sharp whirring of the power tools bouncing off the walls of the District had damaged her hearing. She always shrugged it off, however, because she is far too young to lose her hearing, even if she does live in District 2. She might have to shout sometimes to catch her father's attention, but he is far older than her, too.

Genesis simply wondered and moved on. The streets of District 2 are busy. Sound travels. That is all there is to it.

That was all it should have been.

"Genesis! Come on out, your friends are here!" her mother calls from the front of their modestly sized house in the stoneworkers' neighborhood.

Genesis lifts her head from her desk as a familiar length of dread curls in the pit of her stomach. She reaches for a handkerchief and wets the end with the glass of water sitting on the desk. Pushing herself to her feet, she begins to wipe the last of the tears from her face, her cheeks uncomfortably warm with embarrassment even though no one else knows about her moment of weakness.

Waking up, she was okay. Maybe that was because the house is quiet in the mornings. No stray thoughts, no reason to get frustrated.

After breakfast, however, the now familiar sting of anxiety settled in her chest to stay as she waited for her friends to arrive as they planned. If she is to be honest with herself, she really doesn't want to see them.

She isn't angry at them or anything. Even though her mood has been going south more often than not, they still consider her their friend. Genesis is somewhat baffled as to why, sometimes.

So, it's not that she has a grudge or anything. It's simply not safe for her to be around them. It's not even safe for her to be in this house, in the room next to her mother and father, They are completely unaware of the danger sleeping under their roof. And because they are unaware, they can greet Genesis every morning with warm smiles and cheerful small talk.

Genesis squares her shoulders, but inside, she trembles and resists the urge to scream. To finally blurt out the truth.

She is a Mu.

Exiting her room is more difficult than it should be, but she pries herself from it and heads to the front door. She greets her father with a wave and stands still as her mother hands her a light jacket.

Although mother's concern for her wellbeing travels the distance between them in soft waves, Genesis almost flinches at the intensity of the thoughts. Even worse is knowing that she doesn't deserve it.

She is a Mu. A monster. The floor is still dented where her powers knocked a pot over in a moment of anger. If that pot had been filled with boiling hot water, her mother would have suffered severe burns.

Genesis gazes up at her mother's soft, rounded face and resists the urge to hug her and admit to everything. Everything. Being a Mu, fearing rejection. Fearing most of all that she won't be able to stop herself from hurting everyone she loves.

It's beyond frustrating. She has poured hours and hours into thinking of a way to control these powers, but nothing she tries works for long. There is nothing else for her to do but give herself up. Let the Capitol handle her monstrous side. Let the Capitol protect the people she loves from herself.

"Genesis, what's wrong?" her mother voices, leaning down. Genesis shakes her head and plasters a smile on her face.

"It's nothing!" Genesis says, turning around with a little jump to her step as she goes to greet her friends. "See you later!"

Genesis runs outside fast enough to miss her mother's parting words entirely.

The next challenge is facing her friends. Genesis slows just as their thoughts flow into hers. Irina is concerned with one of their childhood friends who she has a crush on. Even just staring at the crease in her brow and the firm set of her lips as she listens to Riley ramble tells of her frustration.

 _Can we stop talking about her for once? Geez…It's always about Riley, isn't it._

Genesis reluctantly approaches them with a slow wave. "Hi, guys!" she says, painfully cheerful in comparison. It pains her to fake that cheer and draw warm smiles from her friends.

They all head down the road together, intending on meeting up with their other friends further down the road near the schoolhouse. All the while, Genesis feels as if she is going to jump out of her own skin. One wrong move and she could hurt any of them beyond repair. She keeps herself to vague answers and simple smiles whenever Irina or Riley turn to ask her a question or look for a comment.

She almost can't wait to stand on that platform and finally tell the District about her lies. She won't have to keep up this exhausting farce, these painful attempts to protect everyone from herself.

Of course, she knows that she has almost no chance of winning. There are always Mu with extraordinary strength and control over their powers in the Games. Genesis doesn't stand a chance - but then again, she doesn't particularly want one.

If there is no way to fix Mu like herself, it's probably for the best that the Games exist. It's not as if she has done anything to deserve this, but neither have her friends and family.

The thought actually manages to relax her enough that she doesn't rise to the bait when Zackary, who Riley had developed a crush on, teases her about being nervous for the reaping. Nor does she do anything when Riley's thoughts turn dark and sour, regarding Genesis with slight disdain.

It's so ironic that she wants to laugh. But that urge is one she can resist, at the very least.

* * *

 _Celestia Hemingway_

 _Age: 18_

 _8:45 AM_

The day that Celestia Hemingway has waited over half of her life for is finally here.

Last night, she could hardly sleep from the elation running through her veins. The thrill of every training session she has undergone, the pure adrenaline that comes with pushing her body to its physical limits in anticipation of this day - all of it built up inside her over the course of twenty-four hours.

She did sleep, in the end, because there is no way she is going to ruin every carefully laid plan because she was a little overzealous and couldn't fall asleep. Now that she is well-rested, a cooling sense of calm flows through her rather than the heat of excitement.

"A picture-perfect smile," her mother reminds her from behind. Celestia sits as still as one of the finely carved marble statues in her family's workshop. She barely twitches as her mother runs a brush through her hair, platinum blonde just like her father's. "I know you'll do us proud."

Celestia smiles a perfect sort of smile that one of her mother's old friends taught her years ago: "Not only must you curve your lips in a graceful arch, the rest of your face must follow! A crinkle of the eyes, a tilt of the head, yes, just like that!"

"I will not let you down," Celestia promises with every ounce of strength she has within her.

Her mother places a calm, gentle hand on her shoulder and redirects Celestia's head to face the mirror, as she had slid slightly out of place to answer. Celestia corrects herself as her mother winds small sections of her hair into a braid to tie at the back of her head, leaving the rest to fall freely.

"Our future rests with you," her mother says unnecessarily. Celestia breathes evenly as she listens.

Her mother finishes with a small flourish, a little wave of her hands, and smiles into the mirror as she places her hands on Celestia's shoulders, giving them a little squeeze. She doesn't hug her, but Celestia doesn't expect her to ruin her hard work. Seeing the hope in her mother's bright blue eyes is enough for her.

"Celestia. I am so proud of you," she says as she reaches into for a small jewelry box on the side table and withdraws a small silver pendant. She presses it into Celestia's palm. "Tributes used to bring tokens into the arena with them to remind them of home. You don't have to wear it, but the Capitol loves tributes with-"

"Tributes with a story to tell," Celestia finishes with a smile into the mirror's surface. She carefully lifts her arms to fasten it around her neck, already crafting a story that is as far from the truth as possible. She knows that the pendant isn't anything important to her mother. All of the belongings that she cherishes are locked away under the floorboards.

No, the pendant is simply another tool to lead her to success. There will be twenty-something other tributes with her in the arena. All of them will be Mu capable of wielding devastating powers, while Celestia will have her training and District 2's legacy and pride to ride her through the Games.

When she was very young, she wondered if she could pull it off. Now, after over ten years of honing herself for this day, she doesn't have to wonder anymore.

Celestia rises with a small flourish to show off her black dress and smiles charmingly at her mother, imagining that she has just finished with her interview. She gives a sweeping, ladylike bow with a lingering and beckoning gaze before straightening her back and relaxing her expression a bit.

"Perfect," her mother says with a simple clap. "I know you'll do just fine. The other tributes might have those monstrous powers, but you…"

"Please don't worry, mother," Celestia implores warmly, scooping up her mother's hands in her own. "Father, grandfather, and the all others trained me for the Games. Having silly powers is nothing compared to real combat experience and knowledge, right? And you, mother, taught me everything I need to know to show the Capitol who they should really be caring about."

The slightly strained smile on her mother's lips evens out with her words. Celestia straightens her back and stands, breathing in a deep breath of fresh air coming in through the open window. Outside, she can hear everyone's voices excitedly chattering away as they wait for her arrival.

Celestia leaves the house where she was born and raised for eighteen years, her mother trailing behind her.

No, to be more accurate, she should say that she was born in that house and raised here, in the old neighborhood of the craftsmen and their families who chiseled out the finest of District 2's products. Everything created from within the walls of this community are meant for the Capitol and the Capitol alone.

Everyone falls silent when Celestia walks up to her father and her dear mentors, who taught her all she needs to know about the real spirit of the Hunger Games. The Games that existed before this perversion centered around the Mu is still alive in their minds and that knowledge now rests in Celestia's hands. She walks over and clasps each of their hands in turn, giving them a firm shake and a warm, confident smile.

Her father walks around to her side.

"The day is finally here," he says with a slow nod. "You know what to do. I won't patronize you by reminding you any further."

"Thank you, father." Celestia turns to everyone else in the crowd.

Some are family, like her younger cousins gazing up at her with adoring eyes as Celestia's aunt explains for the smallest ones why everyone is so excited for this day. Others are neighbors, some in the same or a similar trade to her family's. All of them are here for one thing.

Hope.

Celestia smiles and turns to address the crowd.

"Everyone. Thank you for supporting me and cheering me on all this time. I will definitely bring victory to our District and with it, our pride and glory back as citizens of Two!" Celestia basks in their clapping and the hope shining out of their eyes.

Granted, she did rehearse that speech a few times last night, but she is glad it was well-received nonetheless.

For all these years, it has been the older generation carrying that hope for restoring their District's status in the eyes of the Capitol. Now, it is her responsibility.

* * *

 _Galen Vikander_

 _9:30 AM_

Galen left his doubts and worries at the door when he left his home for the last time.

As he stands in one of the lines leading up to the psion detection gates, he walks with a confident lift and determined heft to his steps. If any of his classmates notice the change in his gait, they don't comment on it.

Most of them trudge forward, bored and attending only because it is still mandatory. The youngest are the ones who cry and whimper in their spots near the front of the large platform set up for the event. Galen can only helplessly imagine how many of them are Mu, how many will awaken to their powers and either hide them successfully or have their names called one day.

When he walks under the psion gate, Galen squares his shoulders and for the first time since he was fourteen, walks through the gate without suppressing his powers. He strides into the crowd after pausing long enough to let the gate scan his brainwaves and record them, then sets his eyes on the platform. His heart beats wildly in his chest despite himself.

And he waits. As he waits, he hears everyone chatting wildly around him, their voices carefree and flippant while a Mu stands in their midst. This. This is what Galen wants for the future of the Mu, or at least something close to it. A future in which they can stand in a crowd and everyone around them acts as if they are any other person, not something to be hated and killed or captured and controlled. But not like the way Galen is standing among them now, with his classmates completely clueless as to his real identity.

He has to do something. He can't live the rest of his life pretending to be normal, hiding the very essence of who he is for fear of being killed for it. And he cannot wait for anyone else to do it, either.

Galen watches as the mayor drags her feet to the podium, her steps shaky as she glances over her shoulder at the Victor Mu standing just behind her. She looks almost as nervous as the District 2 escort, who keeps tugging on his neon blue lapels as if that will help anything. His blindingly blue smile is probably a product of numerous treatments, because he looks like he wants to bolt right off the stage.

None of these people could possibly understand. He can't expect the other Mu to risk their lives when the odds are so stacked against them, either.

Nothing will ever change if people like him continue to choose to keep their heads down, however. He thinks of the little girl reaped last year. She had no idea she was a Mu before they called her name. Throughout the Games, too, the only thing Galen had ever seen her do was use telepathy to project her dying thoughts to the audience. She hadn't killed a single person, nor lasted beyond the second day.

She wasn't dangerous. Her name was Loretta and she was only twelve.

Galen takes a deep breath. The mayor is launching into her opening speech with extremely faked enthusiasm. On the exhale, a flutter of nerves courses through him. He is signing his life away for - for what, exactly? He might die. He might not make a difference at all. He is risking his life for a bunch of people he has never met and never will meet.

He shakes his head and forces himself to calm down. If he starts to question his purpose for being here or begins to fear dying a horrible death all alone, all he has to do is remember the names of all the District 2 Mu who were reaped over the years to renew his resolve. He might not know them, but they deserve to have someone to stand up for them. And so do the other Mu still living false lives like himself.

These past five years, he has had no one to stand by his side and confide in, no one he can trust with more than a friendly greeting and sharing homework answers with.

No one, not even his mother, will understand anything when he steps up there.

How will they react to finding out that their classmate and son is a Mu?

Disgust, fear, anger?

He watches as the Victor Mu, Canas, dangles a small pendant on a chain in front of the mayor and escort with a teasing smile on his face. Galen has kept an eye on him every year that he appears on stage, but Canas always acts silly and disarming as possible, potentially to make others around him feel at ease. It's clearly not working, evident by the way the escort scoots away from him even as he moves to the podium to announce the results.

Galen has no idea what the Mu is like as a person, if he'll be able to give any useful advice at all, but he has to take a chance.

* * *

 _Genesis Arkose_

 _9:45 AM_

Genesis should be nervous. She should be terrified.

She walked through those gates and made no attempt to hide her powers. Not that she knows how to do that in the first place, but hearing the soft whirring of the machine around her actually made her relax. She managed to bound after her friends and flash them a real, genuine smile for once.

After all, she can't hear anyone's thoughts now. Her mind is blissfully quiet, filled with only her own sense of relief and wonder. The Capitol does this. It has the resources and power to suppress all the Mu who might be in hiding. If the Capitol can protect the whole District from the Mu like this, it can certainly protect them from one fourteen-year-old girl.

"Afterwards, let's go out for ice cream!" Riley pipes. Identical voices of agreement call out beside her.

The reaping used to be an event that all District children feared, apparently, but nowadays everyone uses it as an excuse to celebrate. Genesis did, too, last year. Before everything took a turn for the worse.

Genesis smiles tightly. Just a few more lies and she's free.

It's difficult to focus on her friends' plans for the afternoon, now, because Genesis won't be joining them. They already feel so far away from her, even though Riley is standing just a foot away.

Genesis clasps her hands together in front of her, digging her nails into her skin as silence begins to fall over the crowd.

This is the way things should be.

Genesis stares at the Capitol's broad logo shining on the screen and lets out a steady breath.

The Capitol. Things aren't perfect between them and the Districts. Sometimes, she hears her parents complaining in the kitchen about things she doesn't understand even with mind reading abilities. Something about inspections and regulations. Laws, taxes, that sort of stuff she really doesn't know much about.

All she does know is that the Capitol protects the Districts from the Mu. Every now and again, a news story will break about a Mu being discovered outside the Games and going crazy, killing lots of people before the Peacekeepers manage to bring them down.

"A-Alright! It's the moment you have all been waiting for!" announces District 2's escort, a Capitol man with an extremely odd way of drawing out all his s's and r's. His name is Riegel or something like that. Genesis sort of wonders what the man thinks about. What all the people in the Capitol think about. They seem so different from the Districts.

Though, not as different as Genesis is to all the normal humans around her.

"I do have here our tributes for the 220th Annual Hunger Games! Two of them this year! What a treat!" Riegel cries out, waving the envelope that contains the names of the Mu detected by the scanners this year. "Is everyone ready? Yes? No?"

Genesis holds her breath. No turning back now.

"Alright, then! Let me introduce you to our very first tribute of this year…"

Riegel pauses for dramatic effect to hide the tremor in his voice, though the speakers amplify it across the crowd gathered with ease. He reaches into the envelope and pulls out a white slip of paper, straightening his tie first and clearing his throat before taking an unnecessarily deep breath.

"Galen Vikander! Please do come on up here!"

It's not her. Yet.

Genesis exhales shakily.

She hears the crowd to the back and left of her shuffle and send up murmurs of alarm into the air. Twisting around, she sees the cluster of eighteen-year-old boys part for Galen Vikander. He is a tall boy with a slightly lopsided smile and an air of confidence as he strides into the space between the Peacekeepers who will escort him to the platform. Genesis watches him carefully for a sign of hesitation or fear, but if it's there, she can't find it.

Maybe he, too, wanted to be caught. That is the only explanation for his confidence and the way he smiles so easily. Genesis won't be able to hold that composure for sure. No one will be convinced by it even if she does pull it off.

But she can try. She'll do her best, even if the odds are slim that she will live. Being called up there is all she actually wants. Everything else will be a bonus.

"And now, for the second tribute!"

Genesis straightens her back and silently apologizes to her friends and parents, at peace with the knowledge that they can't hear her. That they can't know she gave up without even trying to suppress her abilities.

"Genesis Arkose!"

* * *

 _Celestia Hemingway_

 _10:15 AM_

Celestia stands with her back straight and her eyes fixed on the platform as the District 2 escort reads off the name of the first of the two Mu tributes. The first tribute is a boy from the eighteen-year-old section who walks with confidence to the front of the crowd.

Watching him sends a thrill of excitement up Celestia's spine unlike any she has ever felt watching reruns of the old Games.

She is sure that the male Mu has some destructive power or another, but none of the Mu who enter the Games over the years are very well versed in actual combat. Some make an attempt to wield a weapon, but they never know how to _really_ use them. None of them have had the level and depth of instruction that Celestia received. The end result is a pitiable thing to watch. There is hardly any fun in watching a tribute use a sword as a club, after all.

So, it doesn't matter that this Mu is confident or that he has the power to break things with his mind.

Technique and skill is what really matters and Celestia has plenty of it.

The mountains of the Capitol tower in the distance in front of her, just within reach. Almost the entire District stands at her back. The weight of their stares will soon be on her.

Their future, too, will be on her shoulders in a few short minutes.

District 2 was once favored by the Capitol. Every person in District who lived through the Wars fifty years ago can attest to that. District 2 was once a prosperous place, so long as their tributes kept winning in the Hunger Games. The training academies flourished, each vying to produce the best fighters year after year. Volunteering was an honor. Winning was the ultimate glory that would go down in history.

Nowadays, there is no glory in having a tribute from Two win.

One of District 2's Victor Mu, the only Victor who actually mentors, is a laughable excuse of one. Celestia watches him listening to the proceedings with half an ear. He apparently makes attempts to net their tributes sponsors, but he is far from the stately and strong Victors that she has heard of from her trainers and grandparents. In fact, he looks weak enough now that Celestia could take him down in a split second.

Celestia, of course, was only three when he won the 205th Hunger Games fifteen years ago. But her parents told her that while he did win, it very nearly killed him, leading to his sorry current state.

And besides that, his actions had wiped out a huge chunk of the arena. His victory had only brought unease to the District. To know that they were housing such a dangerous Mu was not only terrifying, but a smear on their name.

Celestia will fix all of that.

In the old days, the Games helped everyone. Victory brought extra rations for the entire District. Even kids as young as twelve and thirteen, who usually can't help their family bring in income yet, were able to take out tessera for extra food.

But above all, victory brought with it pride and glory. Celestia experienced a small amount of it every time she perfected a drill and one of her trainers praised her. It drover her to push herself to be even better than before. To surpass their expectations of her.

District 2 desperately needs that boost.

The District's escort calls the second tribute up: a short girl of fourteen or fifteen, with dark brown hair and skin and a slight jerk to her movements as she walks up. Confident, or simply hiding her fear? Celestia doesn't dwell on it for long, though. The train rides and training sessions will be more than enough time to scope out the competition.

Just as the escort is about to finish up the reaping, Celestia raises her hand and walks out into the aisle between the boys' and girls' sections.

"I volunteer as tribute!" she announces in a clear, strong voice. Not screaming, of course, nor is it loud enough to hurt her throat. She knows the microphones positioned around the area will pick up on the strength in her tone.

The crowd falls silent. No one volunteers anymore, and certainly not like that.

The escort sputters. The mayor looks confused.

Celestia walks up to the platform and smiles coyly into the cameras she knows is watching her every move.

* * *

Yes, you read that right! Celestia is not a Mu. But they never really created any rule against regular humans entering the Games, so she gets through on a technicality.

Galen Vikander belongs to PercyJacksonAlways. Genesis Arkose belongs to Elim9. Celestia Hemingway belongs to goldie031.

 **Galen and Genesis both end up in the Games for similar reasons. How do you think they'll get along?**

 **How do you think Celestia will fare being a normal human amongst the Mu with their psychic abilities?**


	6. The Reaping, District 10

**Union of the Stars: The 220th Hunger Games**

 _A District that raises living creatures to die shouldn't be surprised when, occasionally, a few of their own are reclaimed by nature._

* * *

 **District 10**

 _Coriana Barksdale_

 _Age: 18_

 _The Night Before the Reaping - 11:30 PM_

Music pulses from the speakers, beating out a rhythm that travels through the floors of one of the two reputable bars in District 10. It's a dim place filled with the slight stench of sweat and hazy amber lighting that accents Cori's long blonde hair nicely as she twists and goes through the steps of her routine. The fake jewels on her outfit glitter blindingly under the harsh lighting just above the stage.

Half of the eyes in the room are fixed on her sensual dance, following every curve and twist of her hips. Cori skims the surface of their minds for a hint of an angle they want to see next, anything she can do to attract their attention for even a few seconds more. She picks apart the heavy thoughts of lust from other, more rational ones, searching for any indication that one of the customers isn't pleased.

Navigating the use of her powers is another dance with its own steps and rhythm. She is so popular because of her supposed 'talent' to anticipate what a patron wants to see, but none of her coworkers or anyone else in the District is aware that her so-called intuition is really mind reading. And to keep it that way, she must be careful about when she decides to answer a customer's desire, when to turn and give that wink over her shoulder without it seeming like she is reading their minds.

Tonight, however, skimming the customers' minds is more or less a waste of effort.

Cori goes through the motions, tossing teasing smiles at a random person every now and again. The other girls on stage with her are equally enthused, their movements less energetic than usual despite the hour. It isn't even midnight yet.

No one is physically tired, but several of the bartenders are already urging the customers slumped over the bar to stumble on home and sleep off the alcohol.

Tomorrow is the reaping, after all.

Cori keeps the coy smiles on her face, but annoyance bubbles over in her chest. They call it a mandatory holiday, but to people like Cori and most of the District, all it serves to do is prevent them from earning money like they would on a normal night.

The thoughts filtering through her mind are mostly grumbles, half-hearted complaints that are irrelevant to her job.

They continue at this leisurely pace for another half an hour before the activity starts to wind down and patrons slip through the shadows and out the doors. Cori stays on the stage along with the other girls to wave at the departing customers.

"Please do come again!" Cori calls out with the coy voice she reserves for interacting with customers. A good voice is one that is both teasing and a promise rolled into one. _Come back, and I promise it'll be worth your while_. Keeping that little bit of mystery in her words and actions usually seals the deal.

As the last of the customers leave and she climbs off the stage, Cori spots her brother's tall form watching the door shut behind one of the bar's regulars. Once the man is gone, Bran stalks over and secures the locks.

Cori flashes him a wave before disappearing into the back rooms to change and collect her pay.

When she returns dressed in normal clothes, busy working the new knots in her hair out with her fingers, she gives Bran a smile. They head out of the pub together, her much taller twin taking the lead. Cori sighs. She doesn't need him to lead her home, but it's just one of those things that there is no use in fighting.

"You don't really _need_ to-" she comments.

"Yes, I do," he says, short and to the point as always. "I see the way they leer at you."

"It does sort of come with the job," Cori points out, though without any animosity or annoyance. Her brother is only looking out for her. And it's not as if his worry is unfounded in light of the thoughts she picks up from some of their customers' minds. "But it's a small price to pay."

She knows that he agrees whole-heartedly. They aren't twins for nothing, after all. But by the same token, he stilll worries. In the end, there is no perfect solution, just the cards they were dealt with and decided to make the best of.

As they walk down the mostly empty, dusty streets, Cori hums a small tune from the theme song of last year's Hunger Games. It will be lost and forgotten soon enough, but she can still hum it for a few more hours.

"It's our last year," she comments, leaving the statement hanging. She sees Bran glance at her. "Excited?"

"Who gets excited for the reaping?" He phrases it as a statement more than a question.

"True," Cori agrees, yawning.

The reaping was always a dreadfully boring event. At least, it was before she turned fifteen and discovered that she's capable of feats that no one, not even her twin brother, can pull off. After she turned fifteen, however, the reaping does take a bit of concentration to get through. She doesn't want to ruin everything she has obtained so far by being detected by one of the Capitol's machines, after all.

* * *

 _Brandon Barksdale_

 _Age: 18_

 _Day of the Reaping - 9:10 AM_

"Hurry up!" Bran barks at his youngest siblings who are already running late despite Cori and Taya going around to wake everyone up almost an hour ago if they weren't out of bed already.

The reaping is, as Bran commented last night, nothing to get excited about. They do have to be on time, however, or risk the Peacekeepers knocking on their door to slap them with a heavy fine that hardly anyone in District 10 can afford.

"Stop dragging your feet!" Bran says as he stalks down the hall and swings open the door to his younger sisters' room. Maiya, twelve and at the age that she doesn't necessarily listen to her older siblings anymore, glances over her shoulder from in front of the mirror and frowns as she continues to fix her unwieldy dark hair.

Dena, at least, darts off the bed and runs past Bran while uttering a quick, "I'm said I'm coming!"

Bran sighs and crosses his arms. To anyone else, his tall form standing in the doorway with a frown would be intimidating. Unfortunately for him, his siblings are more or less immune by now. They know that he isn't truly angry. Not yet, at least.

" _Maiya_ ," he says pointedly. He hears Cori come up behind him, dragging a brush through her hair.

"You look fine," Cori calls out. "Or are you meeting someone special after the reaping? I could help you out if you want some advice…"

He can practically feel the suggestive undertones rolling off her, but they are a bit more exaggerated than she would normally sound around strangers. She's only speaking to their younger sister, after all.

Maiya swings around, getting up with a very subtle stomp of her feet.

"No!" she declares, putting her brush down. She comes over holding a length of worn blue ribbon. Bran recognizes it as one of Cori's. However, she doesn't ask for help. She crosses her arms as if waiting for her older siblings to move this whole time.

"I'll help you fix it up," Cori says with an amused quirk of a smile. "We have a few minutes."

Bran checks the clock on the wall. Not really, but they do live in town rather than outside it unlike when they were younger. They have time, but if he doesn't set a deadline for everyone to follow, it'll be next to impossible to wrangle everyone out of the house. Vale, especially, who still hasn't responded to him once in the past ten minutes.

"You have five," he says before walking back down the short hallway. It doesn't take much for his voice to carry in their small house. "Everyone at the door in five minutes!"

—

They do, remarkably, manage to all be standing outside their house six minutes later. None of their neighbors give them a second glance anymore, but Bran distinctly remembers when they first moved here nine years ago. He doesn't think there was a single pair of eyes that resisted the urge to stare at the motley group of Barksdales. Camden's red hair and Maiya's dark hair and skin stood out the most amongst the rest of their siblings with far lighter features.

Bran could always care less about other people's opinions of them. The knuckles of his right hand still bear a thin line of white scar tissue that stands out against his deeply tanned skin. He got it in a fight after school when he was ten and had run out of patience for the kids who constantly teased and tormented his siblings for something that was beyond their ability to control.

Nowadays, however, he would almost call things peaceful. Cori's job and Vale's outbursts at school aside, people have more or less stopped it with the rumors and Bran hasn't had a reason to get into a fight with anyone for a while.

After one more minute of Taya trying to get a handle on where everyone is going after the reaping, they are finally off and walking down the dusty streets to the open plaza where the reaping takes place each year. The size of District 10's main town is nothing compared to the rolling fields beyond it where almost all Panem's livestock is raised. The streets smell of dirt and the faintly musty, faintly sweet scent of hay.

"Are you gonna cry again like you did last year?" Vale asks out of the blue, directing his question at Dena. Their youngest had trotted off, humming the same tune Bran heard Cori humming last night.

"I didn't cry!" Dena protests. "Right, Maiya? I didn't cry!"

"You 'got dust in your eye'," Maiya says unhelpfully.

Cori laughs from her spot walking next to Bran. Unlike his twin, his younger siblings aren't quite so good at crafting a good lie.

"Why were you crying?" Vale asks sharply. Bran frowns as Dena continues to deny it, then passes it off as 'because the music was really sad'. "Only babies cry at the reaping. And that's 'cause they don't know what's even going on."

This could be a bit of a problem. Bran was watching the finale with Cori last year. Their siblings were all either at home or off doing their own things, so he never found out.

Seeing as Cori was busy chatting with Taya, Bran walked up next to Dena and laid a hand on her shoulder.

"Vale, leave her alone," he says sternly. Vale opens his mouth to protest, but the deeply serious glint in Bran's eyes silences him this time and he turns away with a huff. Bran looks down at his sister. "Ignore him. But we do need to have a little chat. You're not in trouble. I just need to tell you something."

Dena gazes up at him curiously and nods, her blonde curls bouncing as she walks. She likes to imitate Cori, always bobbing along and walking on her toes. She still flips through Cori's old books about dance, but Bran hopes she eventually grows out of it.

"Why were you crying?" Bran asks after a minute.

"I wasn't," Dena says, though her lie is transparent. "I got something in my eye."

"Try again," Bran says wryly, shaking his head. "It wasn't because of the music."

Dena doesn't respond for a while. She hears him, though, and she is thinking of something. He can tell from the way she twists her hands in her dress and the way she stares intently at the ground in front of them.

"I just thought it was sad," she says, her voice already rising defensively. "That girl's District partner stabbed her in the back. They looked like they were good friends."

Bran sighs. He, too, thought the participants in the Games were somewhat pitiful when he was Dena's age.

"Dena, the Mu aren't human," he reminds his sister firmly. The image of the only Mu he has ever seen in person flashes through his mind. An out of control Mu in the center of a sea of flames and screams. He runs his hand through his hair, but as usual it refuses to lie flat and flops back into place.

"I know," Dena says.

"They might look human, but it's probably only a ploy to trick us. They're dangerous, and not like how a cow or a horse can be dangerous. Mu hurt others intentionally."

Dena's bright blue eyes glance away, unconvinced despite her sharp nod. Those eyes are the same blue as his and Cori's, but the three of them couldn't be more different.

"I just want you to remember that," Bran finishes with a sigh. He can't launch into a rant about them, not unless he wants her to space out and forget half of what he said, but he can do this much. Work the idea into her mind that the Mu don't deserve her pity or sympathy.

The reaping might be a bother, but it's necessary.

* * *

 _Coriana Barksdale_

 _9:50 AM_

Cori walked through the gate with an easygoing smile as she directed Maiya along, keeping one hand over her shoulder so they didn't get separated by the crowd. Looking at her, no one would expect her to be a Mu, especially one so close to escaping the Capitol's clutches.

She feels her abilities fade, streaming away from her like a trickle of water through a cracked glass. The familiar push and pull of her telepathy disappears, but she is more than used to ignoring it by now.

"You're back there," Cori says to Maiya, pressing her hand between her sister's shoulder blades as she points to the back section of the roped off area containing everyone from twelve to eighteen. Maiya rolls her eyes up at her and crosses her arms as she separates herself from Cori's side.

"I know!" she calls out, waving before she spots one of her friends in the crowd and runs off to greet her.

Cori isn't worried. She turns around and heads back to her own roped-off section at the front without a second glance. If Maiya was a Mu, too, Cori would have known. Her sisters aren't particularly good at keeping secrets, especially since they have no idea that Cori can read their thoughts if she wants to put herself through that. And despite all her posturing, Maiya could be even more of an open book than Dena. She would have given herself away long ago.

Besides, what are the odds that two kids from the same family are Mu? Cori read up on it, just in case, wondering if her brother had also developed such powers and simply didn't tell her yet. He's the type to keep those things to himself, especially if it'll worry Cori or any of their siblings. However, she found that her curiosity and fears were probably unfounded.

According to the Capitol, the Mu genes are random mutations. Since Bran and Cori aren't identical twins, they should be just as likely to both be Mu as any other random set of people in the District. Although she did think of the possibility, she couldn't come up with a reason for the Capitol to lie.

That aside, she doesn't read her brother's mind much, but he is the last person she would ever think of being a Mu.

The crowd falls silent as a sharp, tinny screech erupts from the speakers.

The reaping has started.

District 10's mayor clears her throat, dark brown eyes reflecting a flat sense of boredom. Cori has passed the woman's house a few times when she still worked as a private escort and had to say that her acting skills were superb. Not quite as refined as Cori's own, seeing as she always knew exactly how to adjust and make herself even more convincing in the eyes of the people she interacts with, but the mayor is doing well at acting like the reaping means nothing to her.

It does. Her daughter went into it just two years ago at the age of fourteen or so.

Cori will never allow her siblings to see her like that. She may act carefree at the gates, but she really does put a lot of concentration into folding that part of her away, deep inside where it can't be detected.

"Welcome, citizens of District 10!" the mayor announces, her voice loud and booming but nothing else. No other emotion that Cori can detect with her ears alone. "We have again gathered here today to commemorate fifty years since the final and terrible days of the Psionic Wars, which, as I am sure, many of us still hold bright in our memories…"

Apparently, long ago, it was the Dark Days that were featured in the mayor's opening speech. Nowadays, it's the Psionic Wars. They've covered it in every single grade at school to some degree or another. Cori blocks it out entirely, quite sure that the woman's words are the exact same ones she has been using for over a decade. She just wants to get this over with so she can go have a nice lunch with her family, most of them at least, and get some errands out of the way before work.

It'll be a good night for business. Last night, she had picked up on the customers' intent to return to the bar after the mandatory viewing parties and gatherings finish for the evening. The reaping always puts everyone in a great, celebratory mood, and Cori would be loathe to miss the opportunity to make more money than usual.

"Can everyone give me a great big round of applause for this momentous occasion?" calls Ten's District escort, a short and tiny woman with a pink wig larger than her own head. Her name is Mally, Merry - something like that. "Fifty years! Can you believe it? Fifty! I don't know about you, but I simply cannot wait to find out what special events they'll be holding for this one!"

Cori almost sighs in boredom - almost. Instead, she replaces it with an indifferent, unamused quirk of her brow.

Just about everyone in her age range has drifted apart, but she does still see the people she knows from school every now and again. She has a certain image to maintain. Even if it seems like no one is paying attention, it doesn't hurt to keep the act up.

"Since it's the big fifty this year…" This fixation on the fiftieth year since the Mu started being reaped into the Games is really getting old. As far as Cori knows, they still only host Quarter Quells according to the actual anniversary of the Hunger Games. "Why don't I mix it up a bit?"

"Please, let's just stick to protocol. I think that would be the most efficient way of going about it," the mayor informs Mally, Merry, whatever her name is.

"Oh! I suppose you're right." The pink-wigged woman reaches over for the envelope in the mayor's hands and rips the seal off with a dainty flourish. "Let's see, let's see…Oh! Two tributes for Ten this year! And…oh my."

"Malorie," the mayor sighs.

"Right!" Malorie, not Mally or Merry, nods with what has to be exaggerated enthusiasm. She reaches into the envelope and plucks a white slip of paper out. "Our first tribute is…Brandon Barksdale!"

It's not her.

It's.

Cori's eyes widen. She sucks in a breath that halts halfway down her chest and stays there.

"Bran?"

* * *

 _Brandon Barksdale_

 _10:25 AM_

Brandon Barksdale. That _is_ his name, but it must be another Brandon. That air-headed escort of theirs must have misread the Mu's name. He knows a Brenden from school. And another family by the name of Airedale, though he doesn't remember any of their first names.

Everyone around him instantly started shuffling away from him the second they heard his name. Bran swings around, eyes flashing with anger at the Peacekeepers' white uniforms stalking down the aisle towards the eighteen-year-old boys' section.

"Will Brandon Barksdale please step up? Yes, you right there! Hello!" Malorie the escort says, waving obliviously in Bran's direction.

Finally, the anger spreads from the disbelief trapped in his throat to the rest of his body, filling his lungs and gut as he screams. Unlike many who are reaped each year, it isn't a scream of grief, but outrage. As the Peacekeepers get closer and the other boys his age scramble to get away, Bran seethes.

"I am not a Mu!" he shouts, voice thick with conviction, making the Peacekeepers hesitate in their silent march towards him. They pause, statuesque, as if waiting for the suppressors to fail and for Bran to attack them with - with his _mind_. "Your machines must be broken! This is a _mistake_! I'm not a Mu! That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard!"

He doesn't get a chance to say anything further. The Peacekeepers recover, reminding themselves that he is only one eighteen-year-old boy against their guns and machinery. As far as Bran knows, not a single Mu has ever managed to use their powers while at the reaping. The Peacekeepers show no fear as they reach his side and jab the tip of their rifles against his side.

Bran snarls, about to lash out with a fist.

"Cut it out, kid," the one on his left hisses. "Don't make us shoot you. They won't care if one of their tributes drops dead a little early."

Bran takes a reluctant step forward.

Old memories of the destruction he had seen a Mu create first-hand come to mind. The screams of its victims, the burning of flesh.

"I'm _not_ a Mu," he says, his voice thick with scathing hatred. He is human. He might rely on his fists a little more than others. He might be prone to solving his problems with violence, but he isn't a unnatural freak of nature like the Mu.

"You keep telling yourself that," says the Peacekeeper on the left.

"You'd better pray you're right," says the one on the right gruffly as they step up onto the stage and Malorie trills a meaningless greeting. "Mu that don't know how to fight don't exactly last long in there."

He isn't talking about fighting with fists.

Bran trembles with anger as he reaches the stage and faces the crowd, hands clenched at his sides.

"Okay, okay! Everyone say hello to your first tribute! And now!" Malorie continues right along, somehow unaffected by the anger rolling off him. Brave or stupid, pick one. "Everyone give a big round of applause for District 10's second tribute! Coriana Barksdale!"

No.

That isn't his sister walking up here.

All of this is a mistake.

Bran watches the cameras narrow in on his twin's face, her eyes glimmering with tears. But without talking to her face-to-face, even Bran can't tell if it's real or an act. No. It has to be an act. It is. Cori is just acting. She's not a Mu, either. She's his twin sister.

By the time Cori is on stage, Bran is ready to fly off of it, but there is no enemy for him to attack here. The enemy looms over their heads, the logo of the Capitol swinging on the flagstaff above the platform.

Bran watches as Cori's shoulders quiver and she bursts into tears. She spares him a small, discreet glance, but he can't tell what it means.

"This is a mistake," he says quietly as Malorie finishes up her speech. "I'll fix it. I'll make sure they realize what a mistake this all is."

* * *

Uh, yup, we won't get to Cori's reaction until the train rides. I also feel like parts of a lot of tributes' personalities will be best displayed later on in the high stress situation that is the Games as opposed to the relatively calm opening chapters.

As for _how_ both twins got the Mu factor when it's supposed to be randomly distributed...well, let's just say someone was being lazy that day and infected two in a row to fill their quota. Mu are human, in the end! They get lazy, too.

Coriana and Brandon Barksdale belong to Golden Moon Huntress.

 **How do you think Cori is going to react to finding out her brother is also a Mu? And how is _Bran_ going to react when he finds out Cori has known all these years?**


	7. The Reaping, District 5

**Union of the Stars: The 220th Hunger Games**

Wow, this got long.

* * *

 **District 5**

 _Calista Steren_

 _Age: 16_

 _Two Days Before the Reaping, 11:45 PM_

Callie pins a large white sheet of paper to the only flat expanse of wall left in the entire store. The paper is actually the reverse side of an outdated map of Panem, a diagram of the Districts before the Mu wiped out a portion of northern Nine in the Psionic Wars. When she was very young, she used to believe that the Mu had altered every existing map of Panem to erase that part of District 9, not realizing that the flaw in her logic stemmed from her own ability to do so.

After pushing in the last thumbtack, Callie picks up a rickety lamp and takes a seat on the floor a few feet away, her brother and sister scrambling to take a seat on either side of her. Her sister, Lucille, pushes a stack of old books over, disturbing a small cloud of dust. Callie runs her fingers along the cracked and brittle spines, smiling faintly, remembering the first time she read each of them either behind the counter or in the storage room while her parents worked.

"Which one do you want to read tonight?" Callie asks.

"Oh, 'at one!" says her five-year-old brother, Marcus, jabbing his finger at one of the books halfway down the stack. He still has a bit of trouble saying the 'th' sound, but his meaning is more than clear. Callie turns to her sister, all of eight-years-old and already quite assured that she can handle more 'adult' books.

"That one's fine," she says with a lift of her chin, probably proud of herself for not arguing with their younger brother for once.

Callie smiles knowingly.

"You sure?"

"Yup."

"Okay," Callie says, lifting that book out of the stack. The soft, comforting scent of old paper greets her as she flips to the twenty-fifth page where they left off a few nights ago. She takes a moment to run her fingers over the words.

Although she would rather be reading a new book, one of the thick volumes that came in the store's most recent shipment, she usually selects an older story to read and enact before her siblings. The familiarity makes it easier to form concrete images in her mind and project them for Lucille and Marcus to see. It is a little boring, she admits, but the two never last long before sleep steals their attention away. She knows, too, that she shouldn't push their luck by going any longer than they do.

Callie clears her throat, exaggerating a bit, and reads the first few lines in her head before concentrating on the sheet of white paper stretched out along the wall.

"About half past ten the cracked bell of the small church began to ring," she recites as an image flickers and begins to fill her makeshift canvas. "…and presently the people began to gather for the morning sermon."

An old, narrow wooden church shimmers against the white, a flat expanse of blue sky behind it. She holds in her mind the image of a large bronze-colored bell made of thick metal with a large, three-inch crack in its side. There is no sound, but the bell sways as the figure of a man appears to strike it.

"What's a sermon?" Marcus asks, breaking her concentration. The image trembles and fades.

Lucille crosses her arms, huffing wordlessly.

"No interruptions!" she says pointedly, clearly parroting Callie's old warning.

Callie shakes her head and nudges them both in the sides.

"A sermon is a speech," she explains. "A talk someone gives at a church. And a church is-"

"A place people went to in the past to learn how to do good and pray for good luck," Lucille finishes with a self-confident smile. "Am I right, Callie?"

"That's right," Callie says.

It's actually not. It's the explanation she mustered up to explain the concept to Lucille when she was younger. Panem doesn't have churches anymore, at least not in District 5. Callie vaguely remembers learning about their purpose by piecing the clues together from a whole bunch of old books that hardly anyone is interested in buying.

As Callie watches her siblings continue to argue about interruptions in the story, she is overcome with a tormenting desire to know that fact for sure. It bubbles in her chest with no outlet and no possibility of relief.

 _Do_ the other Districts have churches? Do people still believe in the old ways? In strange and mysterious forces that explained the world they live in before they had science, and technology, and a Capitol to tell them what to believe in?

These are things the books don't tell Callie.

She is lucky to have books that tell her they existed at all, true, but it isn't quite enough to satisfy her.

Because she knows there is a world out there beyond the pages in her hands. Not all of it is fiction. Waterfalls, winding rivers etched into the center of the nation, and jagged peaks that reach for the skies - they all exist in real life. They aren't Capitol propaganda and they can never be covered up.

Callie stares forward at the wall in front of her. How she wishes she could see it all!

She smiles, though, because she would need more than one life to see everything the world has to offer even if she could leave this house, this District, this country. It's an impossible wish, but hers all the same.

"Okay, okay," Callie says placatingly, redirecting her siblings' attention by continuing the scene.

She imagines all the characters of this town, the colorful characters penned by someone long gone, and gives life to them to the best of her ability.

"The Sunday-school children distributed themselves about the house and occupied the pews with their parents, so as to be under supervision."

Small figures, moving with the same energetic gait as her brother, trot down the halls of her illusory church, their parents looming over them with watchful eyes as they find their seats. The main character, a bright and jaunty boy by the name of Tom, comes onto the scene next. Callie can effortlessly insert him into the scene, having read this book and his adventures more than enough times to have a clear image of him in her head.

"The crowd filed up the aisles…"

And so the story continues.

* * *

 _Mordecai Coulomb_

 _Age: 16_

 _Day Before the Reaping: 5:30 PM_

The machinery is good for drowning out any desire to use telepathy.

Solomon, the man who taught Mordecai everything he needs to know to survive life in District 5, told him that on his first day on the job as a Mu just awakened to his powers.

He had been working in the power plant for a few weeks before Solomon casually reached over to help him recalibrate a terminal and told him in soft undertones that he isn't alone. Mordecai hadn't believed him until the man took him aside during a break and explained that the improved performance of the machines in his sector wasn't a coincidence. Some Mu amplify the power and ability of an outside force and Mordecai is one of them.

The machines surrounding him groan and creak at a constant rate, sending deep vibrations throughout the facility. Mordecai can feel them radiate up his legs through the rickety metal platforms and walkways that wind through the massive warehouse.

Memorizing those rhythmic thrums and holding them in his mind, he taps at a control screen and projects low waves of psionic energy into the terminal. Those waves will travel through the system, energizing the reactions and performance of the machines along its path until it peters out. Doing so over and over again throughout the day raises the turbines' peak performance, generating more energy in the long run.

One Mu's power alone isn't enough to make a significant difference, but ten put together produces results. The kind of results that the District and the Capitol by extension don't mind turning a blind eye to. District 5 is needed to power the entire country, after all.

The irony is not lost on Mordecai, but it doesn't incite anger in him or anything. It's unfair, yes, but it's not anything that one, ten, or even a hundred of their kind can do anything about. It's enough for him to fly under the radar, to keep himself in check and follow the unwritten rules that the lucky few in District 5 live by.

Don't use telepathy. Don't use any ability other than the one that augments your work.

Don't tell anyone but another Mu what you really are, not even your family.

Mordecai glances up from the next terminal at the digital clock complete with the day's date and time until the next shift is over.

The reaping is tomorrow. All of the other workers are excused from the event, but Mordecai must attend. It gets him out of school, at least, so it's not a terrible thing. He survived last year's selection and hopes that if he does the same thing, this year's reaping will pass over him as well.

As he progresses through his row, Mordecai picks out the workers who he knows to be Mu. They seem like every other power plant worker with not a single indication that they are doing anything but mindlessly checking the terminals and jotting down their specs. Mordecai returns to his work, alternating between activating his amplification powers and checking the machines normally, depending on whether he is near someone else at the time.

"The key to it," Solomon told him, "is to never, ever let anyone see."

The reddish glow is difficult to conceal once Mordecai started using his powers deliberately. It only needs to be active for a precious few seconds to work, but it appears all the same. Solomon had showed him what to do to keep it as dim as possible.

Eventually, a few hours later, they receive a fifteen-minute break. Mordecai gravitates towards the other Mu who work in the same sector, including Solomon. None of them have ever gone up to each other and introduced themselves as Mu, nor has anyone except for Solomon used their telepathy to communicate with him, but they know his identity just as much as Mordecai knows theirs.

Solomon takes a seat next to him on one of the cold metal benches in the lunchroom. The others are chatting around them. Isabel, recounting her toddler's antics with an annoyed smile. Owain, about his son getting married next month.

Mordecai is happy to work alongside them. There are some he gets along with better than others; Isabel's straightforward approach to work and life is easier to deal with than Owain, whose sarcastic humor sometimes gets on his nerves. But all of them work hard and never slack off. Nor do they treat Mordecai different because he is younger than them.

"Are you nervous?" Solomon asks lightly as he takes a bite of a sandwich. Mordecai turns his head to him, holding a question in his dark brown eyes. Solomon smiles. The wrinkles around his eyes and mouth stand out when he does so. It's a question people tend to ask each other around reaping time, usually with a joking smile. It probably has something to do with the old Games, the ones that were around before the Mu were thrown into it.

"No, of course not," Mordecai smiles politely. It's a standard reply. Solomon nods.

"I'll see you there," he says, surprising Mordecai. Solomon laughs lightly. "It's my daughter's first reaping."

Mordecai has an idea, but the curiosity still lingers between them awkwardly until Solomon answers his wordless question.

"She doesn't know. Neither does my wife."

"Are you worried?" Mordecai ventures a guess. Maybe that's why he asked Mordecai that.

"Nah, no more than a normal parent," he says, keeping it short in case anyone overhears them, though Mordecai can hear the strain in his voice this close to him.

The Mu factor is an evolved, mutated gene of some sort, so it should keep passing on through the generations in some form. He wonders if any of their children inherited the Mu factor. If he keeps his head down and contributes what he can to the Capitol, will he also be allowed to raise a family someday? And if he has a child, will he have to worry about them being stolen to participate in the Games? Does the small protection they receive as diligent workers one of the Capitol's essential resources carry over to family?

"I'll keep an eye out for her," Mordecai offers. He remembers his first reaping to be somewhat scary, even if he hadn't been worried about the reaping itself back then. The sheer number of people gathered together can make it a bit intimidating.

"Thanks," Solomon says, clasping a hand over Mordecai's shoulder firmly. As usual, their minds are quiet to one another. "If I don't spot you at the reaping, I'll see you at tomorrow night's shift."

"Yeah," Mordecai nods. _Good luck,_ he says to himself.

* * *

 _Calista Steren_

 _Day of the Reaping: 6:30 AM_

Callie rolls out of bed early, pulling on a pair of her mother's old, mended jeans and a shirt worn away at the hems. Pulling her warm honeyed brown hair into a short ponytail, she stumbles for the back door, grabbing a forest green jacket and canvas bag along the way.

The morning air is chilly against her face and bare fingers, but she shoves her hands in her pockets and continues down a small set of steep stairs leading down to the back roads.

As she leaves the bookstore where her family lives behind, she glances up at the dark indigo sky rapidly fading into dawn. She smiles up at the bright, rounded disk of the moon, glad that it at least shines through the smog over District 5.

The stars, which are nearly impossible to see through most of the District anyway, have all but faded into a blanket of cloudless periwinkle by the time she reaches the scrapyard where discarded machine parts are later sent to various Districts to be recycled. Most of it is junk - wires frayed beyond repair, twisted bands of metal that are impossible to mould even with Mu powers - but there are a few nice gems here and there.

She especially likes finding batteries. Anything larger is a bit difficult to fuel, but her amplification abilities work well on small devices that require them. She spends her time picking through small sections of the rubble, occasionally running into a kid or two her age or younger. They ignore each other for the most part. It's against the rules to root through the trash, but no one reports each other, either.

She spends the better part of an hour tossing bolts, screws, and batteries into her bag as the sky fades from blue to blood-shot orange to blue again. When the sun has risen as a glowing red disk on the horizon, she and all the other kids scatter and leave. The Peacekeepers will return to their posts soon, and no one is willing to chance an encounter.

By the time she gets back, the scent of breakfast wafts down the narrow path leading up to the house.

Callie smiles as she runs up the stairs and to the door, twisting the handle and entering to a warm cloud of comforting smells. Blue cornmeal porridge fried with butter and topped with eggs and a bit of red chili sauce. A bit of milk and honey, a family favorite.

"I'm back!" Callie says as she steps inside, hanging her bag in the entryway as she takes a seat at the table.

Marcus squirms.

"Can we eat _now_?"

"Of course." Their mother smiles, amusement dancing in her eyes as she walks over with a mug of dark-roast coffee, the good stuff that they save for special days.

Callie smiles and digs in. Today will be a good day. It might be the reaping, but for the past several years she has managed to get by without being detected. If she could handle it then, she can surely handle it now.

"When the reaping is over, can I go hang out with Becky and the others?" Lucille asks sweetly after giving it some time for the food to settle.

Their mother opens her mouth to protest, but their father beats her to it.

"No one is going to come by the shop today anyway. Let them have some fun."

"I'll mind the shop if you want to step out to do errands," Callie offers. "Today's my day off."

Callie works at a power plant after school like most kids her age in order to supplement her family's income. The bookstore doesn't earn them much, just enough to keep afloat, but her parents can no more get rid of it than they can resist smiling at all the fond memories it holds. People do still find time to buy books, though, and Callie loves to sit down with them during the night shift and recommend a book that will truly suit them.

So, she really doesn't mind spending the rest of the day in the bookstore, especially if it means unboxing the new shipment of books. Although books that take her to other lands beyond the reaches of Panem are her favorites, she'll read anything from esoteric volumes about goldfish breeding to a compendium of Jurassic-era dinosaurs.

"No, your father is right," their mother smiles. "Go enjoy the day with your friends."

Later that morning, as Callie is standing amongst her friends at the reaping, she hears nothing but old arguments and praise that grate on her nerves. It makes her reconsider spending the rest of the day with them, if only so she doesn't have to listen to them extol the Capitol's virtues.

"Haven't any of you paid attention in history?" she asks her closest friends harshly, though not in the loudest voice, of course. "Don't you know who the tributes were in the Games _before_ the Mu ever came along?"

"Yes…" says her friend, Gina. Her small smile and hesitant tone mark the beginning of another bout between them. The rest of their friends groan. "But that changed when the Mu revolted. Of course, what happened before was terrible, but things are better after we all realized it's the _Mu_ we should be fighting, not each other."

Callie shakes her head in dismay and opens her mouth to retort, but Gina's cousin beats her to it.

"Can we _not_ talk about this now? During the _reaping_?" she says with a huff. "Are you _trying_ to get us in trouble?"

The reaping is, in fact, starting. Most of the crowd has quieted down already. The fifteen and fourteen-year-olds around them murmur their complaints as District 5's mayor stands up to give the opening speech.

Once, the mayor spoke of the Dark Days and the crowd below cowered in silence as they waited to see which of their children would be stolen from them and forced to kill each other for the Capitol's entertainment. The Games were feared, hated, not a subject of boredom. Actual records of the old Games are sparse, Callie suspects, because the Capitol doesn't want people to think too much about the animosity between them and the Districts.

Just like how the Capitol restricts the types of books released - the novels and biographies, the children's books and even dictionaries. Entire worlds of truth and knowledge quietly erased before they ever see the light of day.

Callie holds her breath as the reaping proceeds past the opening speech to the drawing of the names. Everyone around her watches, somewhat wary, but they aren't scared for themselves so much as the fact that a few 'monsters' are standing in the crowd alongside them. Callie tells Lucille and Marcus not to be afraid and that she isn't nervous, either, but she knows the possibility that the Capitol will detect her each year is always present.

This year, there are just two tributes to call. Callie watches as the first slip of paper is unfolded painstakingly. The microphone crackles as the District 5 escort clears his throat and leans forward with a huge, comical grin.

"Alrighty, first up is…Calista Steren!"

A ripple of curious murmurs passes through the crowd. District 5 is large enough that at first, only Callie's friends gasp and draw away from her. But slowly, all attention focuses on the small patch of concrete where Callie stands.

She has read the old transcripts of interviews with Victors from the first hundred and seventy Hunger Games. In them, the Victors from the outer Districts always spoke about the train rides and the magnificent grandeur of the Capitol, the food they tasted and the technology they got to try before going into the Games. Reading them, Callie sometimes harbors a tiny, guilty desire to see it all for herself.

It seems she got her wish.

The tiny trill of excitement mingles with dark threads of anxiety as she gathers up her strength to move towards the aisle. She keeps her eyes focused straight ahead at the stage, glad that her siblings are standing somewhere in the rows behind her. In a way, she is glad they don't allow Mu to say goodbye to their families like they did in the old days.

She doesn't know if she could face them at this moment. To explain that this isn't one of her beloved fantasy stories. She hasn't done anything to warrant being publicly humiliated and executed, but she has to go into this fight to the death anyway.

But that also hurts most of all, she realizes as she numbly goes to stand next to Five's escort. She'll have to leave them without a single explanation.

* * *

 _Mordecai Coulomb_

 _9:45 AM_

Mordecai meets Solomon's daughter at the reaping just outside the psion detecting gates. She looks just like her father - a little short for her age, with an easygoing smile. Mordecai waves to her easily, but his attention is drawn to her father. Solomon's eyes are calmer than they were yesterday.

"Happy Hunger Games," Solomon says, gently prodding his daughter to take a spot in the long line leading up to one of the gates. "This is Amelia, my daughter. Amelia, say 'hello' to Mordecai. He's one of my coworkers."

"Hi!" Amelia beams up at him, though judging by her distracted sideways look, she is clearly excited to get away from her father's side and find her friends in the crowd. It might be a bit difficult, given how many people are gathered here already.

"Hello." Mordecai greets her with a polite smile.

"You have a younger sister about Amelia's age, if I remember correctly?" Solomon mentions.

Mordecai nods. He glances over his shoulder to his own family, particularly his younger sister. As far as siblings go, they look rather alike; tall, with dark brown mops of hair and light brown skin. Neither of them really stand out in a crowd, but Mordecai doesn't mind. It's for the best, anyway.

"She's thirteen, though," Mordecai mentions.

"Do you need any help in there?" Solomon asks Amelia, who shakes her head and faces forward, more eager to pass through the gate than Mordecai has ever been, even before he found out he was a Mu. Solomon laughs a rumbling deep in his chest and shakes his head. "Kids."

"I'll look out for her if you want…?" Mordecai offers.

"It's okay," Solomon says, though he gazes a bit apprehensively as Amelia steps forward in the line. "She was nervous a few days ago, but she seems fine now. Sorry to have bothered you with that."

"Not at all," Mordecai says. He glances at the large sleet-grey clocktower across the plaza. "I'll see you later today."

Solomon nods and gives him a carefree wave as he disappears into the crowd.

No use putting it off. Mordecai goes to retrieve his sister from his parents' side and steps into a line with her.

"I mean, it's the last year we're gonna get together after the reaping, so we want to make it good, but we don't know where to go…" Lilith says, a small whine in her voice. Mordecai glances at her and nods sympathetically.

She has, actually, been whining about it since last night. Most kids in Five start getting jobs around their fourteenth birthday, and Lilith is already thirteen. He knows she won't be working in the same power plant as him, seeing as all spots are full at the moment, which is just as well.

He has never told her or his parents about his powers, just as Solomon had him promise two years ago. It's for the best that as few people know as possible. It's best to act as if he is any other, hard working District 5 citizen, no matter how much he trusts and loves his family.

As long as he does that, he hopes he can live out the rest of his life like the other adult Mu he has met.

After walking through the gates, Mordecai doesn't feel any different from before.

Tall, imposing towers made of steel and thick lengths of cable surround the entire plaza, sending out steady and invisible psion waves to disrupt a Mu's powers entirely. But there is nothing for him to amplify here and he never uses his telepathy to read minds or anything.

When he was fourteen and just coming into his powers, he heard bits and pieces of conversations every time he walked outside. They climbed and climbed in loudness until Solomon taught him how to clear his mind and block them out. Nowadays, he has no problem hearing only his own thoughts milling around in his head.

He takes his place in the section for sixteen-year-old boys, keeping his expression passive as he looks around. His friends are gathered a little way's off, but it's so close to the start time that he doesn't bother wading through the crowd to greet them.

The reaping starts and Mordecai's heart rate speeds up a bit. He is both worried and not worried at the same time. He tells himself that Solomon and the others all managed to survive until this day. They went through the reaping each year, worked hard, and proved themselves useful enough to escape persecution. Mordecai is grateful that he wound up in that power plant, grateful for that chance.

"Alrighty, first up is…Calista Steren!" calls District 5's escort.

Mordecai watches an unfamiliar girl the same age as him pick her way through the crowd. The cameras show off her deeply freckled face set in a mixture of excitement and apprehension.

The second slip of paper unfurls.

"And the next up is…" the escort says, drawing out the last syllable, "…Mordecai Coulomb! Come on up!"

Mordecai's eyes widen. His heart jolts in his chest and his stomach fills with a bitter, acrid sense of betrayal. It presses up into his throat as he watches his name appear on the screen, followed by the camera training itself on his barely concealed shock.

How?

He tried his hardest to do good work. He never slacked off or took a personal day. Solomon said that the Mu who keep their heads down and contribute to the District are allowed to slip through the cracks. He has never even used his telepathy, nor the other abilities humming dormant within him.

He watches the Peacekeepers approach him and bites his tongue.

Then he steels himself against the pain and the faint fear trickling down his spine and goes to meet them halfway. There is no use complaining. No use protesting, in ruining his chances at victory before anything even starts.

There is nothing to do now except keep his head down, accept the hand dealt to him, and channel all his energy into trying to get through the Games alive. It's not impossible. Every year, one person wins. The probability is tiny, but it's not time for Mordecai to give up yet.

* * *

Part way through this chapter, I realized that I forgot to emphasize the importance of regional foods. How could I? This is the Hunger Games! But rather than go back and try to force it in, I'll just be more mindful of it from here on out...I'm using the official map that Lionsgate came out with, so District 5 is located somewhere in the Southwest.

I really feel like Mordecai's personality will come out better when he starts interacting with the other tributes, buuut I tried, and hopefully his part is interesting! It certainly made me think a bit more about the Mu situation and some of the things that go on behind closed doors (aka _more_ worldbuilding, I love it but wow does this story have a lot of little details).

The book that Callie reads to her siblings is The Adventures of Tom Sawyer! The quotes come directly out of it.

Calista Steren belongs to ConcreteClouds. Mordecai Coloumb belongs to Elim9.


	8. The Reaping, District 7

**Union of the Stars: The 220th Hunger Games**

Dream sequences are loads of fun! Now would be a great time to mention that, being Mu, their dreams aren't always just dreams...

* * *

 **District 7**

 _Celis Alberink_

 _Age: 18_

 _4:57 AM_

 _This is a dream. A silly byproduct of sleep. A series of neurons firing in accordance with his memories._

 _None of it is real._

 _Not the hands clasped around his collarbone, their touch feather-light against the the strong thrum of his pulse._

 _Not the warm body pressed against his back. Nor the thick slide of blood running down his shirt._

 _In the real world, he would be able to move. Shove the hands and arms away. Do something other than breathe harshly into a hazy world of dense pines that choke the light out of the sky and shower upon him. Each one is as sharp as a sewing needle, as quiet as a pin falling to the floor. One strikes his hand, drawing a thin line of blood that he barely feels._

 _Words bubble up in his throat, suffocating him. They sink into his lungs and rot there, dense as tar._

 _" **Stop.** " The thought echoes in the dreamworld. It travels to the far reaches of the darkness on the horizon without a single echo._

 _Eventually, he manages to move his head. He looks up at a face with shadowed features, at the soft curve of a smile. That smile taunts him as much as it eases the tension out of every muscle in his body._

 _His fingers twitch._

 _" **Let…me…go…!** "_

 _His body is his to control in real life, but not here. Here, it's subject to the whims of that phantom looming over him. Every night he has this dream and remembers it as such, he comes a little closer to throwing its grip off. But every single night so far, he wakes exhausted before he can accomplish it._

 _The sky above them twists and howls. It is the screech of a wild animal in the deep logging forests. It is the piercing whistle of the winds that cut across the untamed lands to the north and descend upon the borders of Seven. It is land that even the Capitol cannot fully keep under their grasp. No fence is long enough to lock that world away. No wall can ever stop the wind._

 _Still, his jailor does not move. And the blood continues to seep into his clothes, into his pores, sinking beneath his fingernails and surrounding him with heat._

 _" **I don't need you!** "_

 _The sentiment lingers in the still air between them, but through the warmth of the blood in his hair, he feels a sense of calm. A steady presence that promises not to leave. The sort of companionship that only exists in fiction. Or in dreams._

 _He opens his mouth and gasps, gulping in a deep breath of air scented with dirt and rotted undergrowth._

 _The forest writhes. The shadows curl and shiver like the last of the autumn leaves clinging to branches._

 _There might be nothing beyond this single patch of earth. The horizon, an inky black abyss, may end up nothing more than purgatory. But even if he loses himself forever in it, anything is better than remaining rooted to this spot with needles raining down upon him and an apparition wrapped around his body._

 _His chest heaves and he can almost feel the physical effort of it, the strain it puts on his muscles, the adrenaline flowing into his veins._

 _The grip on him is incredibly strong despite feeling more insubstantial than air._

 _Perhaps that is why he can't break free._

 _He stops struggling. He lets it pull him under a wave of warmth and suffocating calm._

 _For how many months has he had this dream? In every iteration, he has never given that apparition form. He has never wanted to imagine the face it wears as it hovers above him. He never thought to give it a name._

 _If he changes that, will he finally be free of it?_

 _He looks up._

 _A pair of eyes framed by light brown lashes. Golden brown hair, dulled by the shadow of the endless canopy, falls against his forehead._

 _With a monumental effort, he lifts a hand and then an arm. He brushes the strands away and needles scrape his skin. The scratches drop tiny beads of blood down his arm as he opens his mouth to address that faintly taunting smile. It never wavers, even as it becomes stained with blood like grotesque lipstick._

 _The hands around his collarbone travel upwards, ghosting over his throat, and dig into his jawline. The pressure is odd. Crushing, without a single bit of skin contact. It continues up to his eyes, letting him breathe for the first time in ages._

 _Air floods his lungs._

 _It tastes of blood and dirt._

 _Before it reaches further, he opens his mouth and gives it a name._

Linden.

 _The world stills._

 _When it starts again, he is alone, surrounded by pillars of great silver firs that stretch into the darkness. Even the wind is frozen._

 _Then a breeze starts up from behind him, pushing insistently but ever so gently at his back._

 _" **No.** " It's easier, this time, to squeeze the word out. " **No. I won't let you control me again.** "_

 _He swings around, finally able to move, and out of the corner of his eye he sees a smile._

 _A soft, curving smile. It mocks him as it fades into the darkness._

Celis wakes with his heart pounding in his chest and his body soaked in sweat. For a moment, he is frozen in place, unable to do more than twitch his fingers and toes. It's eerily similar to his dream.

After a few minutes, however, he regains control over himself and rolls onto his side, the blankets sliding down to the floor as he breathes heavily in the cold silence of his room.

Mornings in District 7 have that sort of lonesome quality. Normally, the District is astir with deafening sounds of heavy machinery, trees crashing to the ground in the forest, and people hacking away at thick trunks with axes and saws. Only in the early morning hours is it so quiet. The forests barely twitch except for the flutter of birds and small woodland creatures moving in the leaves.

Celis pushes himself out of bed and checks the time. The reaping isn't for hours. It's still too early to start work, either.

However, he knows he won't be able to go back to sleep after that dream.

Celis wanders outside, pulling an old woolen jacket around himself as he heads down the narrow dirt path to the family's paper mill. The building has moss growing over its walls and smells strongly of algae from the river it was built over, but the structure is sound.

The heavy wooden doors creak as Celis opens them, but his parents are always dead to the world in the mornings. He shoves them back into place before lighting a lantern and heading into the room where the water mill's main components are located.

He entertains the thought of starting work early. They will lose a few hours due to the reaping and are already behind on a shipment.

Might as well. There's no use in wasting time sitting around watching the sun rise.

It might chase away the last dredges of unease lingering from that dream, too.

* * *

 _Sephiria Belrose_

 _Age: 17_

 _7:50 AM_

Seph lies awake with her eyes wide open, seeing only a bright haze of light that indicates it's morning and not nighttime. A slow purr somewhere above her head alerts her to the presence of her cat. She reaches up and nudges its soft fur with her fingers. The cat stands and shakes, the tiny bell on its collar jingling as it walks around to her side.

"Morning, Mimi," she says absently as she scoops the cat up and slides her legs off the bed.

She is more than familiar with the room after living in this apartment for the last seven years. At least, thanks to Myron's status as a high ranking ex-Peacekeeper, the apartment is a decent size with very little furniture. It doesn't matter much now, but seven years ago, she would have crashed into anything and everything he left her home alone.

Seph shuffles over to her closet and sets Mimi on top of a stack of crates she had Myron drag back to the apartment from the market. He hadn't really _wanted_ to, but by the end he wanted her to stop complaining more, and so she got her crates.

"Stay," she tells Mimi, giving the cat a scratch on the back of her ear. The cat sits, the bell shifting as she moved.

Seph closes her eyes so that the screen of light disappears and darkness returns to her. Focusing on the presence in front of her, she concentrates her thought waves on the cat.

When she opens her eyes next, she can see.

They aren't really _her_ eyes. Her eyes are useless things that can only tell her if the lights in a room are on or not. These eyes see the room, including her closet, but everything is cast in dull tones of grey and sepia.

Their owner looks down all of a sudden, closing as Mimi licks one of her white paws.

When she looks up again, Seph takes the opportunity to scan her closet. Her clothes are the most difficult thing about being nearly blind, really. Myron usually does their laundry and he never puts it back in the order she specifies. If she wants to actually match her outfits, she has to convince Myron to get in here to sort them by color at the very least.

She makes it quick, before Mimi decides to stop listening to her and wanders off. Once she has selected her outfit for the day - a simple but pretty grey dress to accentuate her eyes - she cuts the connection off and returns to her normal, empty vision.

Getting dressed, walking into the main living area for breakfast - all of it is mundane and activities she vaguely remembers seeing before her vision took a turn for the worst and fell apart entirely.

She walks over to the table and pulls out a chair, smelling Myron's mug of black coffee across the way and a bowl of porridge beneath her nose. She picks at the mostly tasteless stuff a bit disinterestedly. The Capitol gives Myron a decent stipend each month, but he doesn't waste it on fancy foods. Seph doesn't really understand what he uses it for, really, except to buy her an outfit every now and again to get her to stop pestering him.

This lifestyle is bare-bones, boring in almost all senses of the word, but she has gotten used to it.

"Has my father been permitted to contact me, or are they withholding even our once-a-year call now?" Seph asks Myron, perhaps unnecessarily caustic seeing as she needs him if she wants to speak to her father at all.

The old man exhales a forceful huff. She can tell he is shaking his head, but little else. Myron is too good at dodging her attempts to skim for his emotions. She doesn't try to push it any further. He knows her too well for that.

"Haven't gotten any news yet," he says gruffly.

Seph nods, keeping her back straight and proper as she eats this tasteless gruel the Districts call oatmeal. She doesn't let the frustration and disappointment to show on a single aspect of her face, but it stings. She hasn't seen him in seven years and they never talk for more than a half hour every year. It's not nearly enough to update each other on their lives.

"After the reaping, maybe," Myron suggests.

"You don't need to sugar-coat it," she says.

"Just trying to be optimistic here," he retorts.

They finish their breakfast in silence.

Seph doesn't need his assistance to get out of the apartment.

She does, unfortunately, need to leave her cat behind. It's fine to take Mimi along with her to school and other places in the neighborhood. Seven is a large District with plenty of places for a cat to walk. The reaping is the exception.

She picks her way carefully down the steep concrete stairs and begins to slowly make her way towards the central town. Unlike some of the citizens in Seven, their apartment is quite close to outskirts of the town and not in the forests far beyond it. She hears the trains carrying the people from the outer parts of the District as she makes her way down the road.

There isn't much around out here except for birds soaring overhead and the occasional squirrel in a tree. None of the people passing by stay long enough for her to seamlessly integrate her consciousness with theirs so she can see, which is why she left so early when the reaping starts at ten.

Eventually, however, she hears a familiar chorus of voices and narrows in on one of the girls.

Linda Brewster. Good enough. She's quiet, steady.

Seph focuses on her voice telling everyone about her older sister's wedding.

There isn't much she can do with her own body while she sees through another's eyes. Nothing complex, at least. She keeps her head down and walks slowly as she memorizes the path through Linda's eyes. When Linda looks to the ground for too long, Seph switches again to Norman, a tall blond boy who gives a pretty nice perspective from his five foot eleven vantage point.

One of them spots her out of the corner of their eye and she is forced to return her concentration to her own body in order to smile and wave with feigned familiarity and friendliness to them.

"Good morning!" Seph calls.

They return the gesture. For the most part, they don't take note of her Capitol accent anymore, and stopped giving her the cold shoulder years ago. It makes walking among them and borrowing their sight much easier than it was when she was ten.

One does have to be grateful for the little things, she supposes.

* * *

 _Celis Alberink_

 _9:30 AM_

Great silvers and subalpine firs, hawthorns, and quaking aspens line the roads and woods between the houses in District 7. The trees grow thick and high enough to choke out the sun in places. In others, entire swaths of forest have been cleared by hand and by machine.

Only on the reaping and mandatory viewing days do the machines sit quietly in the open sun.

Celis passes one such site on his way to the central town and heads down an unevenly dug out path to the temporary housing on the borders of the forest. Thick columns of smoke rise out of chimneys that tower over his head.

"Celis! You're late!" says the familiar voice of his friend, Yulian, also eighteen but taller than Celis by a few inches. Celis greets him with a wave as he jogs over to join him. "How rare. You're never late."

"I slept in," Celis says, a thoroughly unconvincing lie coming from him. In reality, he had lost track of time. No matter how hard he tried to shake it, the dream from this morning had persistently nagged at the back of his mind.

"Wha-at? Did you have a late night or something?"

"No, I…" Celis pauses. "Never mind."

Yulian leads the way back to the main road, whistling a sharp and unfamiliar tune.

"He wouldn't want you to spend your last reaping in a slump, you know." Usually, Yulian's warm, friendly voice doesn't bother him. Most of the time his advice isn't very practical, but Celis is never irritated to hear it.

Not this time. Yulian has no idea what he's talking about.

His lips twitch downward in a frown as he turns his head away, staring into the trees. A thin fog has settled over the District in the night, leaving the distant horizon a blanket of grey.

"He…" Celis pauses.

Even knowing the truth of their friend's death doesn't make it any easier to guess what he might have felt about this day. Yulian waits for him to finish, ever patient, understanding in a way that is almost laughable.

Or perhaps not. Just because Celis knows the secret that Linden took to the grave doesn't mean he understands their late friend more than anyone else.

"Maybe you're right," Celis finally acquiesces. Maybe he is. Linden was the type to wear his heart on his sleeve, but in the end he withheld his secret from all but Celis. The one he wanted to bear that burden was not Yulian, nor his parents, but Celis.

Why? Celis has asked himself this many times.

Of course, he knows the answer. Linden himself told him before he died. If Celis keeps asking, it's only out of some vain hope that the answer might change if he asks it enough times.

"You…" Yulian stops himself before he finishes. Celis looks at him curiously, but his friend shakes his head. "It's just…you haven't been the same since he died. You don't even complain about the reaping anymore."

"It's called growing up," Celis retorts, though he agrees with his friend. There is no use dwelling on thoughts about a boy who has been dead for two years. And yet here he is, losing sleep over a question he already knows the answer to. "One has nothing to do with the other."

He doesn't say anything else as they reach town and join a group of their other classmates on the way to the center of town. There is nothing else _to_ say.

Everything passes by in a blur. Checking in, walking through the gates, finding a spot to stand.

As he listens to the mayor recount the terrible losses incurred during the Psionic Wars, an old and familiar spark of satisfaction passes through him. He clings those words.

"The threat of the Mu is ever increasing, but the Capitol's efforts to combat them and protect us all from their grasp also increases by the day!" says Seven's mayor with a spark of passion and a tremble of his old voice that marks him as someone from the old generation.

There is no refuting that logic, is there?

Maybe Linden was an anomaly. A Mu who was born wrong, without that urge to destroy and injure.

Celis is suddenly glad that he is gone. The other Mu, deceitful creatures that they are, would have eaten him alive in the Games.

He will never forgive them, or stop hating that nature of theirs. It's the reason Linden had to die. The reason he felt he had to leave this world before that cruel instinct of his hurt someone important to him. And the reason he burdened Celis with that truth is because he knew he could handle it.

It's a pity other Mu aren't like him, but Celis supposes it's too much to hope for - that they'd all be self-destructive.

"So, then! Here are the results! District 7's first tribute of the 220th Hunger Games is…Celis Alberink!"

"What?" Celis breathes, staring straight ahead. _How?_ "I'm not a-"

All around him, he hears small whispers.

" _Celis_ Alberink, a Mu? That's crazy!"

"He always rants about them."

Celis turns. He recognizes that boy from class.

"I-" But what can he say, even if anyone listens to him?

Celis's mind spins. The first thing he thinks of aside from _no, this is wrong_ is the dream from this morning.

It was a peculiar dream.

"Maybe he was so insistent on it to cover up that he _is_ one?"

"Hey, remember, two years ago…"

"Isn't Alberink the one who was there when Linden Toris got into that accident…?"

Celis stops breathing for a second. His heart drops into his stomach.

He never did ask Linden why he befriended him, did he. Yulian and him were friends because their parents worked together as kids and they saw each other often as children. Linden, on the other hand, had been intimidated by Celis for weeks. He hid behind Yulian every time Celis turned to address him.

The protest dies on his lips.

Why _did_ Linden, a Mu who wore his heart on his sleeve, want to be friends with a boy who hates Mu and even sold him out in the end?

"Celis…" Yulian whispers. Celis whirls around and sees his friends sad, but not horrified, eyes. "The Peacekeepers are coming."

He takes a deep breath. But in the end, the Peacekeepers have to drag him to the stage while he runs that dream over and over in his mind.

That dream wasn't normal. It had felt like someone was intruding on him, _controlling_ him.

And he wonders, as he stumbles onto the stage after the Peacekeepers push him up the stairs, why Linden never told him.

* * *

 _Sephiria Belrose_

 _10:05 AM_

Seph removed herself from Linda's vision shortly before they reached the front of the line. She had to memorize the exact path to gates and the waiting area beyond as she eased her way slowly through the crowd so no one collided into her.

Even though the reaping is a mere formality for her, she still has to attend them with the the District 7 kids, and it's annoying to say the least. The psion suppressors are more than strong enough to cancel out every one of her abilities, rendering her entirely blind until the reaping ends.

Although she is teased for being a slowpoke, she makes it to the seventeen-year-old section without any mishaps by chatting up Norman about some inane spelling bee their school is hosting soon. It's easier to get through if she has a nearly six foot tall shield walking in front of her, after all.

He eventually left to stand with the boys, leaving Seph to follow Linda to the girls' section. And even that isn't so bad. She only bumped into someone once, and a quick apology with sweetened, honeyed words was enough to smooth over any misunderstandings.

For the rest of it, Seph is just bored.

The Hunger Games are a punishment for Mu. A punishment to those who escaped the Capitol's control and a warning for those who still evade them.

But Seph is already in exile. Her name is on someone's list, somewhere, because of whatever her father did to get him fired and her forcibly removed from their home seven years ago.

She still remembers that day and the week leading up to it clearly.

Her father had looked haggard and frantic, but stalwart whenever he came home from the laboratory. He stood tall and smiled down upon her even though he had his own worries. All he asked was that she not reveal her failing eyesight to anyone. And later, after she awakened to her powers, to not use them unless necessary.

Then, one day towards the end of the week, she remembers him looking determined. She had no clue why. With her fledgling powers, she could only tell that he felt completely assured and confident in himself.

It's that impression of her father that stayed with her. It's the strength in whatever emotions he was feeling back then that has her standing tall today.

There isn't anything she can do about being in District 7. Nothing she can do about the Capitol's firm grip on her and her father. Theirs is a game of manipulation and blackmail far beyond her ability. It's frustrating, but the only choice she has is to go with it. Play the good hostage.

The reaping crawls along as she comes out of her musings.

Opal, the District 7 escort wearing a silly looking feathered hat, trills happily, "So, then! Here are the results!"

It's always somewhat interesting, each year, to find out which Mu have been found out. None of them have ever been from Seph's age range. She has never actually come across one, herself, probably because they were younger or older than her. Otherwise, her level of telepathy would more than enough pick out a newly awakened Mu.

"District 7's first tribute of the 220th Hunger Games is…Celis Alberink!"

Another unfamiliar name. It's not that surprising, though. Seph doesn't make an effort to get know everyone in the District, or even everyone in class. Just the ones she doesn't mind speaking to here and there and the ones who are particularly susceptible to the suggestions she pushes on them through telepathy.

The first tribute doesn't step forward immediately, but she hears a chorus of gossip from the girls around her. She doesn't pay them any attention, which is all well and fine. She doesn't care much for their District gossip and they don't care very much to hear a former Capitol citizen's opinion, either.

The few snippets she hears are nothing unusual. People always gossip about the new tributes each year. They make overconfident and baseless observations about how they just _knew_ so-and-so was a little off, so it's not _too_ surprising that they're a Mu.

Seph can't really be bothered except to listen for anyone who manages to get a little closer to the truth than most. Even if she is an exception to the rule, it's a given that she can't reveal what she really is. Who knows what twisted punishment the Capitol will think of if she ever did that.

"And here is our second tribute!" Opal cries out with bottomless excitement. Her hat looks like a living thing bobbing up and down on her head as she moves.

Seph doesn't remember a whole lot about her early childhood, but not everyone in the Capitol looks and acts like that. It was beyond irritating when everyone in her class expected her to start dressing like a poodle and act like she didn't have a single functioning brain cell in her head.

She wonders how long she has to stay here. The rest of her life? The rest of her father's? She wonders every year, but no answer is forthcoming and she stopped asking Myron a long time ago.

His answer is always, "As long as your father continues to behave himself."

And then, two seconds later, she receives her answer.

"Sephiria Belrose!"

She jumps.

"What?" she hisses under her breath, though it's unmistakable that they called her name. She grits her teeth. Anger flushes through her system as she quickly schools her expression into one of composure and indifference, as if she expected this all along.

She hasn't, of course. She is supposed to be exempt from the reaping. But now, now she is going back to the Capitol and far earlier than she ever imagined.

The question is _why_. Why has the Capitol decided to uproot her life yet again, this time to send her in the arena?

As Seph makes her way to the stage, masking her careful steps as her setting her own pace, she bites down on her tongue and starts to think of what her plan should be from here on out.

* * *

Seph is, indeed, from the Capitol, making her a 'Capitol Mu' like Roan.

If it wasn't clear, in Celis's dream he is technically speaking telepathically without realizing it. Normally I render telepathy with all italics, but in the dream I used bold & italics (this site's formatting is crap, I think bold text only shows up as BOLD and not a font weight of, like, 500 on mobile).

Celis Alberink belongs to me. Sephiria Belrose belongs to ConcreteClouds.

 **In light of that, how do you think Seph will fare?** As a reminder, Capitol Mu are born with the Mu factor and have higher psionic potential/power, but a weak constitution or disability (in Seph's case, severely impaired vision).

 **What do you think Celis's dream signifies/means?**


	9. The Reaping, District 9

**Union of the Stars: The 220th Hunger Games**

Only one tribute this chapter! That's why it's so short.

I never received a tribute for District 1, so I guess I'll skip that District for this story, or maybe I'll go back and make up one myself later.

* * *

 **District 9**

 _Homeny Pincile_

 _Age: 13_

 _8:00 AM_

When the wheat in the fields turns from vivid green in the spring to a rich golden color at harvest time in the summer, Homeny enjoys her walks to and from school the most. Even the harshest words from her classmates who feel the need to call her names, steal her stuff, and pretend to be her friends melt away during the time it takes for her get home. She walks as slow as possible on nice days just to enjoy the moment.

Getting up on the morning of a reaping, however, makes the nervousness in the pit of her stomach grow. She isn't afraid of her classmates. But they take her quietness as a sign to pull pranks on her until she does - something.

"If you just talk a little more, I think they'll like you better and stop," one of her few good friends since kindergarten told her recently. When Homeny shrugged, expressing her uncertainty, her friend sighed. "They think you think you're better than them and that's why you won't talk to them. And that's just stupid. But they don't know that."

"I'll try," Homeny told her.

Even so, saying it and doing it are two different things. Not much has changed. All she ended up doing was talking more around her friends and family.

Waking up this morning, she rolls out of bed with a quiet sigh and goes to dig her shoes out of the closet where she hid them yesterday after school.

They are all muddy, absolutely ruined. Her family isn't rich; in fact, they sometimes struggle to put food on the table, especially in wintertime. They don't have the money to buy her new shoes until she completely outgrows these.

She hates it. Hates how they single her out. They think it's fun, but how is torturing someone fun?

That girl who was tribute last year in the Games was the same.

Homeny didn't even know her well, but she had joined the group of boys who push her into puddles when they can and knock over her food at lunch. The girl was a Mu. Couldn't she read Homeny's thoughts, then? Couldn't she tell how much Homeny hated it, how sometimes she even wanted to break down crying?

Homeny stands up, gripping her shoes, and sneaks outside. The water pump is at the far end of their narrow yard, which her mom uses to grow vegetables and herbs to help add to their meals. It's in view of the kitchen, but she knows that her parents will be on the front porch sipping tea and enjoying their rare day off.

She grips the cold metal handle and winces as it screeches a few times before water flows out. Hurriedly, she sticks her shoes under the rush of water and rubs at them with her bare hands, trying to get the worse of the dirt off.

As she scrubs, working the stains out with steady, firm pressure, she spots the blotchy scar standing out on the brown skin. It's located around her elbow and forearm and she swears that she can feel it tingle even though it healed months ago.

She doesn't even have words for how much it hurt.

It was one of the few times that no one in class was trying to say she deserved it or making fun of her for crying out in pain. They stood around, wide-eyed and horrified, until a teacher came over and helped Homeny to the nurse's office.

She goes back to her work.

When she is finished, she sneaks back inside.

"Homeny!" she hears her mom call out, and just in time, as she has just finished shoving her shoes in the closet again. "Breakfast!"

Homeny gives her parents a genuine smile when she walks out. They usually eat simple meals with what they can get their hands on at the time. But reaping days are a little special.

"It's tradition," her mom told her when she asked _why_ one day. "We did it when I was a little girl, and when your grandma in heaven was a little girl, too."

It still doesn't make sense to her since it's not like any of them are Mu, but her mom tends to just smile and say she'll appreciate it when she gets older.

So, this morning, her parents have splurged with thick, fatty slices of bacon grilling loudly in a pan. The warm fragrance of meat hits her nose as soon as she walks into the kitchen, followed by fluffy golden biscuits that her mom pulls out of the oven.

"Eat up," her dad says, serving up the bacon one by one. Bowls of warm grits already sit on the table along with an herbal tea she knows is sweetened a bit with sugar. It's a taste of home, and her namesake. "And Happy Hunger Games."

Homeny nods and smiles, the dark anger at having to clean her shoes off mostly gone. "Happy Hunger Games."

* * *

 _9:52 AM_

Endless fields of crops, from wheat to soybeans to corn, fill the lands of District 9. It took forever to pass through them and get to town, which is even further away from her family's home than the schoolhouse.

At the reaping, Homeny puts a real effort into trying to locate one of her friends. No one will dare pull anything at the reaping with the Peacekeepers watching everyone carefully for signs of anyone who would disturb the event, but she still finds some comfort in being around someone familiar.

She has to push her way through the crowd and murmur apologies repeatedly as she accidentally elbows people in the sides. And like all kids her age, she wants to go hang out with her friends later. It'll be easier to find them now than in the mad rush to leave the area after the reaping is over.

"Trisha!" she calls out, spotting her friend's curly brown hair in the crowd. She lifts an arm and waves as she squeezes in between two twelve-year-olds to greet her.

"Homeny!" her friend beams, her bright smile widening as they come to stand next to each other. "Happy Hunger Games!"

"Happy Hunger Games," Homeny replies.

A second later, a sharp pain in her foot makes her jump aside to reveal a twelve-year-old boy standing in front of them with his fists clenched at his sides.

Around them, other twelve-year-olds are quick to scramble away from him.

"Don't act so happy!" the kid spits. "You never know when _you_ might be next!"

Then he darts off, but that's all he needs to say for Homeny to know what he means.

"That was last year's tribute…Quinn, younger brother, right?" Trisha says curiously.

Homeny nods. "I think so."

She hasn't really thought about it, actually. But now that she does, she can't even imagine going to the reaping one day and finding out that her brother or sister is a Mu. She shudders even thinking about it.

Mu are beyond scary. She can barely watch when they kill each other in the Games, after feeling the blast of one of their attacks herself.

The scar still tingles a bit, though it's probably her imagination.

"Come on, let's go," Trisha says, tugging her to the thirteen-year-old section.

Homeny doesn't pay much attention to the reaping, letting the speeches go in one ear and out the other. Last year, she listened carefully, but it's just the same thing as last time.

She doesn't pay attention until she hears her name.

"Homeny Pincile! Will Homeny Pincile please report to the stage! Wow, can you believe it? Only one tribute this year, everyone! Congratulations!"

No, no, no!

She whirls around, panic clawing at her throat as she sees all the girls around her back away, some screaming, as they point their fingers at her shakily. As if they expect her to blast them off.

She wants to run. Run far away, back home across the fields of wheat.

But her legs and feet won't move. They're pinned to the ground, heavy like sacks of flour.

Fear and pain crush her chest as she remembers how Quinn died last year. Shot right out of a tree and left to die a slow, agonizing death on the forest floor. The Gamemakers eventually put her out of her misery by sending a mutt to finish the job.

That will be her.

She trembles.

* * *

Her name is very similar to the word hominy, a specially processed corn used to make grits, a classic Southern food that is often eaten for breakfast in the Midwestern US where District 9 is located on the official map.

I know I didn't mention her Mu powers at all, but she's a case of having just awakened to them and has no clue she really even has them.

Homeny Pincile belongs to BabyRue11.


	10. The Reaping, District 8

**Union of the Stars: The 220th Hunger Games**

Seven Districts out of the way, 8 more tributes to go. Don't remember if I mentioned this before, but I won't be featuring every tribute's POV during the next stages of the Games, otherwise it would get boring real fast. I decided the order and posted the list on my tumblr if you're curious where your tribute falls.

* * *

 **District 8**

 _Marlan Hendriks_

 _Age: 14_

 _8:00 AM_

"What is this?"

His mother slams the disciplinary letter on the kitchen table, sending a napkin fluttering to the floor. Marlan snatches a glass of orange juice off the surface before it topples over, giving her a disgruntled glare. However, the fury in her grey eyes, which are so much like his own or so he has been told, makes him look away.

"I showed it to you last night," Marlan protests, taking his hand away and folding his arms over his chest. "You didn't seem to care then."

"How many times have I told you not to tell me these things right after I get off work? You _knew_ I just got home from a thirteen-hour shift, didn't you?"

The fury in her voice quickly faded to a bitter sigh of disappointment. The faraway look that enters her eyes is as familiar to Marlan as her anger, but it's no less easy to accept. He almost feels like sinking into the floor, face warm with shame - not for his 'crime', but for how she gazes at him with something akin to pity and resignation.

He can practically hear her saying with a shake of her head, _Just when is he going to grow up? At this rate…_

"Eat your breakfast," his mother says with a note of finality as she turns around to finish panfrying the rest of the french toast.

Marlan glances at his father, who is sipping his coffee and scratching out answers to a crossword puzzle that the older sister of one of Marlan's classmates makes and sells. His father usually has nothing to add, except:

"Marlan, stop giving your mother such a hard time. What exactly did you gain by going around painting all the windows at school with black paint?"

"It's not like anyone got hurt!" Marlan protests, standing up abruptly. His chair slides back with a screech and almost topples over. Marlan catches it before it falls and steps away from the table, shoulders rising defensively. "Besides, I wasn't the one who suggested-"

"Marlan! Sit. Down," his mother commands, whirling around with the spatula still in her hand. "Eat your breakfast. We'll talk about what to do with you later, after the reaping."

Marlan stands his ground and grumbles. He isn't afraid of his own parents. They might've spanked him when he was young, but they don't do that anymore. And it's not like they'll remember to punish him after the reaping, anyway.

He looks down at the plate of french toast steadily turning soggy. It looks sort of like a piece of cardboard half melted away in the rain. Despite the appearance, though, his mother's cooking is actually very good. At least, Marlan has no objections most of the time.

Today, though, he pushes the plate aside and stalks out of the kitchen, ignoring his mother's calls for him to return.

He doesn't know why she bothers to yell at him. It's not like she even keeps up the punishments she gives him, from doing all the chores for the next two weeks to stopping him from meeting his friends after school and work. All that wasted breath for nothing.

Marlan stalks out of their apartment and heads upstairs to his best friend's place.

According to his mother, he and Leo have known each other since they were toddlers. She would bring Marlan to Leo's mother for her to babysit him during the day. And sometimes, even now, Leo's mother sends him downstairs on the nights when his father comes back from the bar drunk and delirious.

When Marlan knocks on the door, it's Leo who answers it. He has to look up to when he waves and grins at his friend. Then again, Marlan is short enough that he has to look up to nearly everyone in his class except for a few of the shortest girls.

"Again?" His friend shakes his head, but he is smiling as he does it. Opening the door, he shoos Marlan inside.

"Again," Marlan drawls.

This apartment has the exact same layout and dull beige walls as Marlan's place, but the warm, creamy smell of buttermilk pancakes and syrup fills the air here. Marlan trots into the kitchen and gives Leo's parents a wave.

"Good morning!"

"Good morning, Marlan." Leo's mother walks over and clasps a hand over his head, ruffling his hair. "You look like you just rolled out of bed."

"Hey! You're making it worse!" Marlan protests, twisting out of the way with a mock-glare. The smile twitching at his lips gives him away, though.

Leo returns to his seat at the kitchen table and motions to the pancakes on his plate.

"Want some? You probably ran out of there without eating again, didn't you."

"No, I didn't," Marlan says, though he knows that he can't get away with this lie. He has done it often enough that it became a pattern. He crosses his arms and shakes his head. "I ate already. I'm full."

Of course, it's not the real reason. Leo's family doesn't make much more than Marlan's parents, but they always have trouble with money that Marlan's parents don't. Marlan doesn't remember how many times Leo came to school without lunch and they ended up splitting Marlan's in half.

Although they might feel like a second family to him, Marlan knows very well that they aren't. So he smiles and lies through his teeth, and Leo and his family play along.

* * *

 _Istora Cottons_

 _Age: 13_

 _9:00 AM_

Istora really loves reaping days.

The day of a reaping and the mandatory viewing days throughout the course of the Games are the only times that her mom and dad are both off from work. On every other day of the year, at least one is around to kiss her good night or see her off to school. But unless she manages to catch them during the ten or fifteen minutes that their shifts overlap, her family can never be together all at once.

Waking up to see both in the kitchen idly preparing breakfast, and eating that breakfast with them is something she looks forward to every single year. It doesn't matter that breakfast is always a simple meal of buttered grits and cheese because. Neither of her parents are great cooks, nor do they really have the energy to put anything fancy together, but she doesn't mind.

She takes the time to tell them all about her days at school, her friends, and anything else that strikes her as vaguely interesting.

"This year, Arya is opening a sort of betting pool? But don't worry, it's not real betting! It's just for fun. She's gonna write it all down and keep track, and at the end of the Games the winner gets a few shortbread cookies from Ayra's family's bakery!"

Istora stumbles over her words a bit, glancing back and forth between her parents to gauge their reactions. Upon seeing their matching smiles and small glances of humor at her excitement, she settles back against her chair somewhat satisfied.

Truth be told, her life isn't that exciting. She doesn't do choir. She doesn't join any of the sports events at school. And her mother won't let her work in the factories until next year.

The Games bring a bit of relief to her everyday life, a little excitement that otherwise wouldn't be present. Of course, they _are_ scary - to the point that she used to get nightmares, even. But as long as she reminds herself that the Mu aren't anywhere near close enough to hurt anyone but each other, she can enjoy watching them.

"Just don't get carried away," her mother says, smiling fondly. "I remember opening a betting pool when I was in high school. It got a little out of hand and the teachers had to break it up, but it was fun."

"Honey," Istora's father says with a pointed, half-serious look. "Don't encourage her."

"I remember you made a good bit of money out of it," her mother teases.

Istora smiles as her father continues to deny it, but inside, she feels a bit…hollow isn't the right word. She just wishes that her life was a bit more exciting. Even her parents had their moments when they were young, like her father's antics that got him in trouble more often than not. Or her mother's resourcefulness that helped feed her five siblings during times when her parents were struggling.

Istora picks at her food, falling into a comfortable silence as she listens to her parents bicker and tease each other.

After breakfast, Istora runs off to get dressed and joins her parents at the front door of their apartment. Though she doesn't know the reason why, everyone dresses nicely for the reaping. Her mother and father, who usually wear worn clothes that have been mended time and time again, have outfits that they only take out for the reaping or if they have to go to a friend's wedding.

As for Istora - she has kept her auburn hair free to hang down to her waist and wears one of her cousin's old reaping dresses. It might be old, but all her mother had to do to fix it up was sew on a new button and fix some of the stitching.

"How is it?" Istora asks.

"Perfect," her mother smiles. "It might not be the latest style, but…"

She sounds slightly apologetic.

"It's okay!" Istora says. It really is. Her friends are nice and she enjoys hanging out with them, but Istora does tend to fade into the background of conversations anyway. For better or for worse, no one will really pay attention to her dress.

They leave their apartment, locking the door securely behind them.

"I think we want to go to the deli after the reaping. To get candy and stuff. Is that okay? What should I get?" Istora has a small amount of money that she gets every reaping day. Her parents can't give her much, but she's okay with that. Most of her friends, Arya aside, don't have much more than her, either.

Istora is busy chatting away about her friends when she sees her mother's eyes widen and her arm shoot out towards Istora. However, it's a second too late and Istora feels a jolt as she ends up crashing into a body in front of her.

"Ouch!" she cries, stumbling backwards while clamping a hand over her nose.

"Oh, I'm so sorry!" she hears.

Opening her eyes, she sees a boy slightly older than herself, with blond hair and gray eyes. He is wincing, rubbing his own nose. Even though he's a bit older, he's rather short.

"I-It's okay," Istora says as the pain fades.

"Are you okay? It's not bleeding, is it?" he asks anyways, leaning closer in concern. It's as if he didn't hear her.

Istora nods. She hears her mother talking over her head, apologizing for her clumsiness. The boy flashes her a brief smile before apologizing to Istora's mother for his own lack of attention.

Istora retreats to her mother's side and waits for them to finish. She wishes that she could be the one to talk to him. _He_ is the one she bumped into, after all. Her mother doesn't have anything to do with this.

She always feels like this, actually, but that doesn't ever seem to change how her mouth remains closed throughout the conversation until the boy turns to her.

He stares for a second, then smiles and holds out his hand for her to shake.

"Sorry. I didn't mean to ignore you," he says, as if he read her mind. She just nods. What else should she say to that? "I'm Marlan. What 'bout you?"

She shakes his hand, certain that her mother told him. Maybe he's just trying to be nice. It irritates her a bit, though, that he didn't just ask her first.

"Istora," she tells him. "I'm Istora."

"Nice to meet you!" he says, breaking away to rejoin his- family? They don't look anything like him. "Happy Hunger Games!"

Istora waves.

"Happy Hunger Games," she says, though he has already disappeared around the corner by the time she finishes.

* * *

 _Istora Cottons_

 _10:50 AM_

Istora can't see anything from the thirteen-year-olds' section. Even the large screens located around the square are either too far away or blocked by all the older kids' heads.

"So, so, what do you think it's going to be this year?"

"What, the arena?"

"What else?"

Istora's friends are all chatting around her, but she sort of fell out of the conversation a few minutes ago. She is currently trying to get a glimpse of District 8's escort, Winoa, a woman who Istora is fairly sure actually wears dead birds in her hair.

"I dunno. Last year were those _huge_ cliffs!"

Just remembering the jagged rocks splattered with blood and guts makes Istora shiver faintly in fear. She wouldn't want to be on the receiving end of a Mu's anger. There wasn't much of that tribute to scrape off the rocks, in the end. Apparently the Capitol didn't like it much, either, because she doesn't remember seeing it in the recaps.

Istora gives up her attempt to spot the District 8 escort. She turns back to her friends, who are all chatting about this or that having to do with the Games. What sort of tributes will there be this year? Will District 8 actually get another Victor this year, or will one of the others steal the spotlight again?

Although Istora likes watching the Games, she feels a tight knot of dread curl in the pit of her stomach just imagining another Mu becoming a Victor of District 8. Eight has three already, though all of them won quite a while ago, and that is more than enough for Istora's liking.

Watching the Games is fun and all, but having them just a few hundred yards in front of her? No, thanks. All the stores replay highlights from their Victors' Games, including all the gory details.

She really has no clue how the Capitol can stand to live with so many Mu nearby. She knows that they're made safe with the suppressors, but still.

"What do you think?" Arya asks, prodding Istora in the shoulder. She is surprised that Arya noticed she hadn't spoken for the last five minutes.

"Sorry, what were you saying?" Istora apologizes, her voice dying a bit towards the end. It was a bit embarrassing to be caught spacing out like that, but Arya just repeats herself. She's good like that.

"Archil isn't here this year. We were wondering what could have happened," Arya informs her, motioning over the crowd towards the back of the stage.

Barathea, District 8's first Victor Mu, sits with her legs crossed and cold eyes scanning over the crowd. Usually, a younger Mu called Archil occupies the seat next to her. District 8's third Victor Mu never comes to the reaping, but this year only Barathea is up there.

"Oh…I don't know," Istora says honestly.

She can think of a few possibilities, but she is filled with doubt even as they pop up in her head. They're all too outlandish. She doesn't want Arya and the others to think her strange for coming up with such things, so she keeps her mouth shut and shrugs.

"Maybe he got sick…" she says at last, feeling the strong urge to say something before the others move on with the conversation and leave her behind again.

They accept her suggestion, though lackluster and not nearly as exciting as they had hoped. Still, it's logical. Mu do get sick, just like humans; they've all seen it in the Games.

In fact, it's sort of scary just how much they're like human beings. That one, two, or even three of them are standing in this huge crowd is unsettling, even if the suppressors are supposed to work against even the strongest Mu.

Istora shakes herself out of it and turns to the stage where Winoa has finally made an appearance. She winces and points to the woman's head, though Arya is the only one close enough to hear and notice her speak.

"She looks like she's wearing a dead cat," Istora says. Arya laughs.

"You're right!"

The weird spotted fur hat has dangling tassels that look an awful lot like legs and a tail as the woman moves about on stage, her movements sort of jerky. However, she makes it to the podium to start the reaping just fine.

All of the speeches are the same as last year, except for Winoa's mention that this is the fiftieth anniversary of the current version of the Games. Istora gazes up, mind humming with boredom after listening to another dramatic retelling of the Psionic Wars.

"I have heard from very, _very_ classified sources that the Head Gamemaker, yes, Leontius Gaudet himself, might just prepare a _very_ special surprise for us this year! As you all are quite aware, Mr. Gaudet has recently begun looking for a successor, so who knows? This might just be one of his parting gifts to Panem!"

Winoa's enthusiasm dies down a bit after her ' _very_ ' special announcement, and with it Istora's interest in what's going on up there.

At least until she sees the envelope come out. Istora leans forward with interest. She should pay attention from the beginning if she wants to get in on the betting pool.

"Let's see! Our very first Mu is, from the fourteen-year-olds, Marlan Hendriks! Please do come up here, dear!"

Marlan, Marlan.

Where has she heard that name before?

It doesn't register in her mind for a moment, and just as she remembers the blond-haired boy whop bumped into her, his image is projected on each of the screens around the reaping area. He doesn't look devastated, like the girl who was Eight's tribute last year. Nor does he look as composed as Archil or angry as Barathea did in the reaping of their own Games.

Istora trembles as the whole District watches him walk up to the stage.

She squeezes her eyes shut and thanks the stars that she got away from a confrontation with him sporting nothing but a bruised nose. He could have done so much worse to her. Realizing how much danger she was in back in the stairwell makes her legs boneless with relief. He didn't seem bad, but Mu are Mu, right?

"Next up is…oh, a thirteen-year-old! My, you two might get along swimmingly! Come on up here, Istora Cottons!"

Istora…Cottons?

Her?

Her head spins. The machines don't lie. So, she really is a Mu?

A…monster?

No, no, no. Mu can't be monsters as they say they are, she realizes as she takes a deep breath. She would never think of hurting anyone the way she has seen those Mu do in the Games.

If she's a Mu, then they can't all be bad. If she's a Mu, that means the terrified ones they see in the Games aren't acting after all. There are tributes who don't ever end up using their psionic abilities to hurt the others. All they do is use it to talk to each other and to the video feeds, and sometimes to make themselves invisible.

Those powers are pretty neat. Istora has always thought so.

She looks down at her hands. They look like a pair of normal hands.

All her life, she hasn't exactly been the center of attention. There is nothing for her to contribute to her friends. She doesn't have siblings and stories of their antics to tell, nor is she particularly talented at anything.

A brief thought that she finally, finally has something interesting about herself to call her own passes through her mind. She won't ever use those powers for hurting people, after all.

But when she looks up, she realizes that it isn't true.

She is going into the Hunger Games. Even if she survives, all of her friends will be giving her these suspicious glares they have on their faces now.

"No, I won't…I'm not going to hurt anyone! I'm-"

Just because she doesn't intend on using her powers, not that she even knows how, doesn't mean everyone will believe her.

Istora shakes her head as a cry bubbles up in her chest and floats up her throat.

Well, she has what she always wanted, but it isn't anything like she imagined.

* * *

I'm really eager to get the Games started but...8 more tributes to go! Two of them are my own, so their parts won't be that long, at least.

Marlan Hendriks belongs to me. Istora belongs to PercyJacksonAlways.


	11. The Reaping, District 11

**Union of the Stars: The 220th Hunger Games**

Another chapter with only one tribute, so it's short.

* * *

 **District 11**

 _Juliet Makepiece_

 _Age: 17_

 _8:45 AM_

J woke up with her head throbbing and the musty smell of Luciano's apartment stuck in her nose. The sharp sounds from the dream still echoes in her ears even though the only sounds present are from the creaking of the old Building. At least the gritty scent chased away the last dredges of the dream, the parts that stunk of smoke and burning flesh and never failed to make her skin crawl.

Even though it had happened years ago, even though she felt nothing but relief at the time, it still plagues her nights every now and again, inviting a perverse mix of satisfaction and disgust.

Sighing, she takes a sip of coffee and starts working a brush through her red, shoulder-length hair. A door behind her creaks open and Luciano shuffles into the kitchen, pausing at the sink to fill a glass of water. As he leans against the counter, he asks her a question.

"Late night?"

"Juliette and I lost track of time," J says with a sharp yawn. She wonders why she even has that dream, sometimes. It's a waste. She hears a choked laugh and a splash of water. Raising a brow, she says, "What?"

"I still find it hilarious that you two basically have the same name," Luciano laughs, taking a long drink of water before shaking his head.

"You better not-"

"I know, I know. I won't tell." A smile. "Your secret is safe with me."

She knows, but it never hurts to remind him. It's not that anyone could really use her real name against her, but J doesn't like hearing reminders of her past, however small. And she hates giving people she doesn't know that power over her even more. Not even to Juliette, as good as she is to J and as much as J likes hanging around her in return.

Luciano knows that. He knows better than to press and ask her to explain herself, or maybe he just has it all figured out from what she has already told him. Either way.

"So," Luciano starts, voice rising in that obvious way of his when he has something annoying to say. "What has you so…off?"

"'Off'? You have to be a little more specific," J says, though she does know what he means without needing him to go any further.

Luciano shrugs. "I can't explain it, it's just that I get the feeling something's bothering you. Did you and Juliette get into a fight? Or did you run into one of your exes?"

"It was just a bad dream," J says, before he has a chance to delve into his 'feelings'.

"Oh. Okay. If you don't feel like talking about it, that's fine," Luciano responds, nodding to himself as he turns to prepare some sort of breakfast for them.

"It was just the same old, same old. Nothing new or exciting."

Nothing to continue to mull over. J makes it a point to refrain from influencing Luciano in any way, shape or form, just in case it makes something click in his brain one day.

She doesn't know exactly what makes the Capitol classify someone as a Mu, but Luciano managed to get through every reaping without being detected. He has no idea that his 'feelings' aren't just instinct or coincidence. She isn't even sure when his powers emerged. Lucian being an empathetic guy by nature, having the addition of weak Mu abilities probably doesn't do much for him in the long run.

Needless to say, she is pretty sure he never figured out she's a Mu, either. And she would like to keep it that way. Luciano is good company, the only one she would trust with her past and bits and pieces of herself, but it's safer for her if he remains in the dark about it. Safer for him, too, probably.

"Are you doing anything after the reaping?" Luciano asks.

"Just going out with Juliette. Maybe a little shopping, or we'll find somewhere to go out to eat. Want to come along?"

Luciano shakes his head. "No, it's alright. I don't want to get in the way."

"Suit yourself," J shrugs.

She uses these outings to get some 'practice' with her abilities, usually to help balance out the bill by poking around in the waitstaff or cashier's head. She's almost sure that Juliette thinks her to be a remarkably lucky sweet talker, which isn't that far from the truth. It helps nudge the process along, combined with a bit of telepathic suggestion.

Being a Mu isn't much of a burden, so long as no one finds out. In fact, it's rather helpful for keeping abreast of things, for staying one step ahead of anyone else. There is a lot about herself that she doesn't want anyone to know in the first place that adding one more is nothing.

J finishes her coffee and goes to dump the mug in the sink, taking a slice of toast from the ancient toaster on the counter. Neither of them are great cooks, nor are they very picky. She nibbles on it as she finishes brushing her hair.

She really is looking forward to a nice afternoon with her girlfriend, though. Being able to treat her to lunch or get her a trinket or two always puts a smile on both their faces, and Juliette never fails to return the favor with a home cooked meal the for two of them, or something similar.

It's fine if she never finds out what Luciano knows about J. The past should remain in the past, as far as she's concerned. It has nothing to do with their current relationship or with the person J is now.

"I'll be going now," J says, waving as she heads out the door.

"See you later!" Luciano calls out.

* * *

 _11:03 AM_

Eleven o' clock, reaping time.

J couldn't spot Luciano in the crowd, but earlier she did pick up Juliette at her house and walk with her to the town square. They squeezed through the hoards of people with some difficulty to make it to the seventeen-year-old girls' section - and just in time for the reaping to start.

Were this any other day on any other street, J would have used her telepathy to convince most of them to give them some room. But to be safe, she keeps from doing so on reaping days. No one in this District, no one she knows at least, has any idea how the detection and suppression machines work, let alone how sensitive they are.

J would rather get elbowed a few times than risk getting detected. She has slid past their checks since she was thirteen and doesn't plan on stopping now.

Past the gates, she can't use her powers anyways. Someone did step on Juliette's toe rather hard along the way, but all J had to do was go over and 'accidentally' stomp on his, complete with a sweet, apologetic smile that no one around them would doubt. The guy ended up stalking off with an angry, flustered frown. He was surely going over to complain to his friends, while J returned to Juliette's gratitude for sticking up for her.

But, the excitement is over now. It's annoying how the Capitol forces everyone to watch the whole long affair when recaps and playbacks run on every single TV unit in the District until the Games are done and over for at least a month. And after that comes the Victory Tour and the whole long process starts again.

Instead of listening to the boring opening speeches, J intertwines her fingers with Juliette's, glancing at her out of the corner of her eye and flashing her a bright smile. Luciano says that J is a lot cheerier around her, a lot less flippant and brusque. Both Juliette and J's past girlfriends never figured out that J isn't the charming, romantic girl she plays at being, so it must work.

Juliette returns the gesture with a warm smile of her own, but she isn't the type to try whispering during the reaping even if no one will really notice.

Low murmurs echo around them, people impatiently shuffling their feet.

J wonders where they should go later. The most popular places will be packed. Juliette has been fond of sweets lately and J wouldn't be opposed to stopping by a little bakery for coffee and a cake to share.

J turns to Juliette to share her thoughts just as the District 11 escort clears his throat to announce the District's Mu for this year. Annoyed at the interruption, she glances at the stage for a brief second.

"Juliet Makepiece!"

J jerks, her hand gripping Juliette's a little tighter as a low current of something - not quite fear, not quite anxiety, flashes through her. No, Juliette couldn't possibly be- J would have known, just as she can tell with Luciano.

But, as soon as she sees Juliette's wide eyes and rewinds the last few seconds in her head, she realizes that it isn't Juliette at all.

It's her. She hasn't called herself by that name in years, but it's hers.

The flash of unease is gone, instantly replaced by annoyance, anger.

Juliette tries to tug her hand away and J lets her go, a bit regretfully. She had been looking forward to their outing this afternoon.

As she turns to the stage and begins to walk forward, she is already running the stages of the Games through her head. She schools her expression into one of calm and confidence. She walks as if she is the one setting the pace, not the cameras and Peacekeepers fixed on her every move.

It's an unexpected development, but she can adjust. She always has.

Eyes fixed ahead of her, she doesn't allow herself to think of the possibility of defeat.

* * *

Luciano raises an interesting point I haven't discussed anywhere yet: it's possible for all Mu to subtly influence the brain wave patterns of normal people, which can make their brain waves either resemble Mu or actually give them small bits of power. Of course, the Capitol Mu do it all the time to infect District children, who become full Mu. This passive type of transference will never create a full Mu, however, and the differences aren't enough for the gates to pick up. You'd have to do a "psychological exam" for that (if you haven't been following the side stories and extra material: it's not a real psychological exam, it's really just mental torture).

In case you were wondering, I didn't make it up, the source material had a similar phenomenon.

Juliet Makepiece belongs to TheHazardsOfLove13.


	12. The Reaping, District 3

**Union of the Stars: The 220th Hunger Games**

This chapter had three tributes, so I condensed their reaping sections. Otherwise, it would get tedious and boring real fast.

* * *

 **District 3**

 _Luis Geronimo_

 _Age: 17_

 _7:00 AM_

Luis holds his breath and concentrates on the ball of discarded tape on his bedroom floor. Holding the image of it moving across the wooden floorboards slowly, he holds his hands out and exerts a bit of his power. Just a bit, just enough to be the equivalent of a small flick of his fingers.

Luis bites his lip as the burst of psionic waves propels the ball of tape across the room to the other wall in an instant. He releases his breath with a slump of his shoulders and leans against his bed. Another failure.

If he knew more about the nature of their, the Mu's, psionic abilities, then it might be possible to pull off stunts on a small scale like this instead of just taking down entire trees with a single blast. Half the reason people fear Mu is because their abilities are so destructive, after all.

Luis, too, has had quite a few unfavorable results over the seven years since he realized he is a Mu. Luckily for him, all of them had been in the privacy of his own home and his parents help him clean up the mess. They all agreed it's for the best that he practice and try to control it, just in case what they say about Mu going berserk is true. So far, it has also worked in keeping the Capitol's gates from detecting him.

For some reason, though, these small feats of fine control just aren't possible. Luis has tried countless times, but he always ends up exerting more force than necessary.

Figuring it's a forgone conclusion for today, he gets up and retrieves the ball of tape, tossing it into the trash on his way out of his room.

"Good morning," he calls to his parents. His mother turns around, her smile creasing the sides of her mouth.

"Luis, perfect timing!" she says, walking over while wiping her hands on a dishcloth. She reaches into her pocket and pulls out some money, pressing it insistently into his hands. "Can you pick up some bread from the bakery? Enough for dinner tonight. I want to get all the shopping done early, before everywhere gets mobbed after the reaping."

Her hands grip his own firmly, lingering for just a second too long. Luis looks into his mother's eyes.

"It'll be okay, mom," he assures her warmly, waiting until the worry fades from her expression. He repeats, for good measure, "I'll be fine. If I managed to get through it when I was twelve and thirteen, it should be even easier now with all the practice I've managed in between."

His mother nods.

"I know. It's a mother's duty to worry, though," she smiles, patting his hands one more time before letting him go. "You'll understand one day."

To be polite, Luis nods. He knows she can't help it; he has read her mind enough times to know, but he prefers to look on the bright side. If he managed to get through when he was twelve, frightened and with only two years of shaky practice under his belt, he should be fine this year and the next as well.

Waving at his parents, he leaves the apartment.

It's still early and District 3 is a sort of drab place between the factories and apartment buildings stretching up to five or six stories into the sky. Luis tucks the money into his pocket, though he isn't usually worried about pickpockets. Telepathy is incredibly useful for catching them long before they get within range to steal anything.

It's not terrible being a Mu, really. The abilities are even useful at times. He images they'd be more useful if he could control them better, but the telepathy alone has saved him a lot of trouble in the past.

It was terrifying in the beginning, of course. He walked around school in fear, jumping every time someone addressed him. With his telepathy still weak and spotty back then, he had been convinced everyone around him found out about his abilities and were only waiting for the right time to turn him in. He normally wasn't anything like that, so it had concerned several of his friends enough that he somehow wound up in the counselor's office after school one day.

The older woman simply wanted to know if there was anything going on at home that would make him so worried and jumpy. In that small, closet-sized room with the usual distractions muted, he had been able to read her mind clearly and realized that no one knew he was a Mu.

In fact, his friends and teachers had simply been concerned for him. It's usually Luis who does the worrying and supporting by listening to his friends' worries and doling out advice where he can give it. That they cared enough to return the favor touches him. In retrospect, of course. Back then, he had just been utterly relieved that no one figured out his secret.

Walking into the bakery, he smiles and waves at the familiar faces, all people in the neighborhood coming to buy something for their pre-reaping breakfast.

He makes small talk with the old ladies dragging their grandchildren along on errands, and with the neighbor two doors down who asks him to look after her twin daughters from time to time.

"They both turned twelve a few months ago, right?" Luis asks the mother. She smiles, delighted that he remembered.

To himself, Luis always wonders if he will encounter another Mu like himself. He doesn't try to reach out with his telepathy, though. His mother had always worried that some would be loyal to the Capitol, or even that the Capitol had planted a few of theirs in the Districts to catch the ones who slip up before the reaping ever occurs.

However, he has interacted with the twins before and he knows they aren't Mu. It's a relief.

Being a Mu might not be a necessarily bad thing, but it isn't wholly good, either. He wouldn't wish it on anyone, that's for sure.

* * *

 _Molly Ziroine_

 _Age: 17_

 _8:10 AM_

Even on reaping days, Molly's mother is working in the electronics factory. It's a massive plant that produces small computer parts for the Capitol and one of two jobs that her mother took on after becoming a single mother for the second time in her life.

Molly has long since stopped complaining. After seeing the toll it takes out on her mother, she hasn't voiced a single complaint, especially because her mother's mind is never filled with a single resentful thought. She is always tired, sometimes irritated or angry, but she never resents Molly or Savannah for her suffering.

How can Molly possibly complain in light of learning that?

So, even on a reaping day, Molly's routine doesn't change. She wakes up early and starts breakfast, giving her younger sister a few more minutes to sleep before she pops her head in their room and yells at her to wake up. It's pretty much the only thing that gets her out of bed, so Molly doesn't exactly feel bad about it.

"So, like, can I have some money for when I go out with my friends? Please?" Savannah pleads, her mouth full of scrambled eggs.

Molly sighs.

"Don't eat with your mouth full," she says.

The downside to raising her kid sister practically by herself is that Savannah definitely listens to her less for it. Sure, Molly could influence her sister's mood by gearing it to be a little more grateful, but she generally tries not to mess with those closest to her after that whole fiasco with their mother and their mother's ex-boyfriend.

"Okay, but please?" Savannah says after she has swallowed. She leans forward, nearly knocking her glass of orange juice over. Molly moves it aside before it spills.

"If I give you enough to get something small, like a few pieces of candy, you have to do me a favor, okay?"

"Anything!" Savannah pipes. "You name it."

Well, with her kid sister, she doesn't even need to influence her mood.

"You leave early and help me go grocery shopping later. You promise?"

Savannah pouts, but the need to match her friends' buying habits outweighs her annoyance at the deal. She nods.

"I promise."

Molly actually wants Savannah to come with her because it makes getting away with free food or paying less for their purchase easier. It's far, far easier to influence a person's mind if they're distracted by the cute little girl chatting their ear off than if they are staring straight at Molly and asking her how she finds the weather or some such thing.

It's far less deceptive, too. When Savannah was younger, Molly would bring her out shopping with her out of necessity. Then, even without using her telepathy, sometimes the grocers would feel bad for the two and give them the day's leftover stock of perishable foods. That was where Molly got the idea in the first place. It was easy to just push the thoughts of wanting to help a poor little girl out.

But, well, that's for later. Molly digs a few coins out and hands them over to Savannah with a warning to keep them safe.

"Thank you, thank you, thank you!" Savannah chants, giving her a hug around the waist as she pockets the money.

"Yeah, yeah," Molly says with a smile. She gazes fondly down at her sister. "Don't forget our promise. Later in the afternoon."

"I know!" Savannah then darts away to prepare for the reaping.

It's true that Molly resented her existence before she was born and shortly after, as well. Their mother's now ex-boyfriend, Chip, had been an awful man. Molly has no qualms about using her telepathy to get him to walk in the other direction when she spots him in the distance on the rare occasions they go out together. Back then, she had known he wasn't the cheery, charismatic man he presented himself as.

It had gone as far as her mother becoming pregnant with Savannah before Molly figured that no matter how much she pleaded her case, her mother would never listen to her. And she had no reason to. Molly knew instinctively, from the moment she met the man, that he was no good. Maybe it was his odd, crooked smile. Maybe it was how he looked at her like she was a small, annoying animal.

Coming into her Mu powers was a gift. It let her know what he truly thought of her, how much he despised having her around.

And above all, it let her do something about him. Once she figured out that her mother wasn't going to listen to her, she decided to take the matter into her own two hands. She pushed thoughts and feelings of dislike and disgust at him, oriented towards her own mother. It hadn't been too difficult at the time, as she had her own resentment to build off. Things did get worse before they got better, but Molly stuck to her plan and eventually, her mother couldn't stand Chip anymore and left.

So, at first, Savannah had represented everything that was going wrong with Molly's life. She hadn't been happy to see her when she was born, nor for a few weeks afterwards.

Realizing how alone her mother had become because of Molly's decision, however, compelled her to do what she could to help raise the child whose father she drove away. It was because of Molly that her mother had gone back to being a single mother. It was because of her that she had to figure out how to support two children with the meager jobs she could get. And it was because of what Molly influenced Chip to do that her mother swore to never rely on a man again.

And it all went downhill from there. Molly took care of Savannah out of obligation and guilt, and their mother worked as much as she could without collapsing.

Molly didn't want or expect to get attached. But it happened.

Savannah hadn't done anything wrong. It was Chip who Molly hated.

And so, somewhere along the way, Molly had gained a little sister.

* * *

 _Kaytlyn Coranat_

 _Age: 13_

 _7:45 AM_

Even though it's the day of the reaping, the clinic runs its business as normal. Kaytlyn's mother is elbow-deep in surgery, literally, and their patients who remain in-house still need to be cared for. Kaytlyn has been regulated to the sidelines all these years, allowed to do little more than sit at the patients' bedsides and listen to their stories, or watch her mother in the operating room from a small window on one wall.

Today, Kaytlyn is bringing everyone breakfast and helping those who can attend the reaping to their feet.

She carries one tray of oatmeal, a small dish of fruit, and a carton of milk across the room to the white-haired old lady in the bed by the window. It overlooks a sparse garden where Kaytlyn's mother helps her grow some vegetables and herbs to supplement their own dinners.

"Good morning, Mrs. Lindblom! How're you feeling today?" Kaytlyn asks with a bright smile. It warms her up inside to see the patients like Mrs. Lindblom, who is here for a fractured hip, brighten up a bit because of her. Kaytlyn carries the tray over and sets it on the swinging table, going to sit on the rickety stool next to the bed.

"I'm doing well, Ms. Kaytlyn." Mrs. Lindblom's smile is shaky, but grateful as she adjusts herself and begins to eat on her own. Kaytlyn smooths out the stark white smock she has to wear when serving food and pulls the hairnet off, releasing her thick, curly red hair. She winces as the net tugs a few strands loose on the way out.

"Oh, you don't have to call me that!" Kaytlyn argues in good humor. She knows that the older generation like Mrs. Lindblom have their habits they refuse to let go of. Still, to be called 'Ms.' at the age of thirteen feels a bit weird. "Call me Kitty, please! All my friends and family do."

Mrs. Lindblom nods once and continues eating carefully. She motions with her free hand to Kaytlyn's nice white dress for the reaping. It has little flowers embroidered along the collar and hem, but not enough to look ridiculous.

"Doing something special today?" Mrs. Lindblom asks in her warm, grandmotherly voice.

Kaytlyn nods enthusiastically, getting up to twirl around once to show off her dress. She is proud of it, as she was the one who picked it out of a magazine for her mother to order. There are a lot of styles going around lately and she thinks this one might be the best out of all her friends'.

"Do you like it? It's my friend Kyra's birthday today, so we're going over to her house for a party after the reaping." Kaylyn sits on the stool, carefully smoothing out her dress.

Mrs. Lindblom smiles at her, but a sort of darkness clouds her eyes. Kaytlyn hesitates before skimming the surface of her mind for the thoughts and impressions she usually finds there.

The sadness is old, but it crawls into Kaytlyn's head the longer she maintains the connection. Hiding a wince, she shakes it off and leans forward with a wide smile to conceal the display of her powers.

Kaytlyn would have left it at that, aware that the memories associated with the reaping brings her pain for some reason. She would have left it alone if not for the sharp tug on her hair and dress from behind, and the pair of boyish giggles from her twin brothers.

"James, Thomas!" Kaytlyn scolds them, to no avail.

The two eight-year-olds rush up to Mrs. Lindblom's bedside and beam up at her with almost identical smiles.

"Mrs. Lindblom! Mrs. Lindblom! What was it like when you were young?" James asks, bouncing up and down as he grips the side of the bed. Kaytlyn shakes her head and yanks at the back of the shirt to get him to stop.

"What was what like when I was young?" the older woman quotes back at them patiently, a hint of humor in her tone.

It's Thomas who picks up right where James left off. "What was the reaping like when you were little?"

Kaytlyn's smile fades a bit and she tugs her little brothers back by the arms, turning to each one in turn with a pointed look.

"It's not polite to pry," she says, quoting the words her mother spoke many times to her when she was young.

"Oh, it's no problem, dearie," Mrs. Lindblom says with a wave and a smile that seems genuine. James and Thomas shake Kaytlyn's hands off and stare at the woman expectantly, with wide grins. "There is nothing wrong with some curiosity in youngsters. It's good for the mind."

Mrs. Lindblom waves them closer, as if indulging them in a secret. Kaytlyn leans forward, too, curious how the woman will explain it when she felt so overwhelmingly sad before.

"When I was a little girl," she says, now adopting a serious expression and looking each of them in the eye for a few seconds. "The reapings were much, much different. There were no Mu, for one. The ones who went into the Games were District boys and girls."

Kaytlyn knows this from school, but she has never really spoken to anyone from that era willing to talk about it. Her brothers make exaggerated gasps.

"No Mu? But that's the whole point of the Games!"

"Why did District boys and girls have to go to the Games?"

Mrs. Lindblom glances at Kaytlyn, smiling a little wider before shaking her head and placing a finger against her lips. "That's a story for another time. You wanted to know what the reapings were like when I was a girl, right?"

The twins pout. "Yes, Mrs. Lindblom…"

Mrs. Lindblom goes into a whole explanation of what she felt like at her first reaping, how terrified she was, and that it lasted until she turned eighteen and didn't have to worry. She could date who she wanted without fear that the Games would take one of them away. The only problem was the Mu.

"Oh, it was terrible back in those days," Mrs. Lindblom says, shaking her head sadly. "You three are so fortunate to live in Panem in these times…Back then, the war with the Mu took so many from us…More than the Games ever did. My little brother lost his life when one made a building collapse. Him, and so many others…The Districts didn't get along well with the Capitol, but that war made us put aside our differences."

Kaytlyn listens while pushing down the insistent feeling pressing against her chest. She wants to say that a war doesn't mean innocent children deserve to die year after year for the crime of being born. If this was any other conversation, Kaytlyn would do so without hesitation. But she holds herself back as Mrs. Lindblom finishes up her story.

If she reveals herself, she'll lose all of this. Her parents, this home, her friends, even her annoying brothers.

"The Capitol protects us from the Mu," Mrs. Lindblom reminds the twins, smiling kindly at them. "So that we don't have to live in fear."

The twins dart off afterwards, the story over.

"Go get dressed for the reaping!" Kaytlyn calls out to them, though she doubts they'll listen. Her father will probably have to corral them into order with just twenty minutes to spare before they leave.

She turns to Mrs. Lindblom with her best, beaming smile, intending to thank her for entertaining them. At the back of her mind, however, she thinks of all the information the woman left out. The fact that the Districts were, just over fifty years ago, the ones who had to offer up their innocent children to die on TV.

Mrs. Lindblom only gazes at her a bit sadly, turning to her breakfast with a small sigh.

"They don't need to know yet," Mrs. Lindblom says mildly, as if she was the one who could read Kaytlyn's mind. "Let them see the world in black and white for a little longer."

Kaytlyn nods as she gets to her feet to finish her rounds.

But inside, she twists and turns at the unfairness of it.

* * *

 _Kaytlyn Coranat_

 _10:20 AM_

Kaytlyn meets up with her friends before the reaping, greeting them with a wide wave and a brief laugh at Miya's dress.

"Another hand-me-down," Miya grumbles, picking uncomfortably at the plaid thing. "It's only been worn a few times, she says! It's such a waste to buy another so soon, she says! It's from thirty years ago! I think it's gone out of style ten times over since then."

Kaytlyn tells them about Mrs. Lindblom's conversation this morning.

"You don't agree with her?" Kyra asks curiously, hearing her distaste towards the end.

Kaytlyn shakes her head.

"Mu are dangerous," she says confidently, all too aware of it herself. "But if they just…go away, live off by themselves, who will they be hurting? I don't think…Well, I feel bad for the tributes."

"Oh…well, I guess it's not the best way to go…" Kyra nods. "But you help your mom out at work, so of course you'd think like that."

"But if that would've worked, wouldn't someone have done it a long time ago?" Miya asks insistently instead.

Kaytlyn, though, doesn't have an answer. She leaves it at that. She shrugs it off and says it was "just a thought" even though she has actually given it a lot of thought. Mu really shouldn't live amongst normal people, but they shouldn't have to die so horribly for being what they are, either.

If there was a way to live apart…

Kaytlyn would miss her brothers and parents terribly. No matter how much sense it makes in her head.

She is rather silent the rest of the way to the reaping.

* * *

 _Kaytlyn Coranat_

 _11:15 AM_

Kaytlyn is nervous. She discovered her abilities right after her first reaping. This time, she was one year older but not much better at controlling them. She wrings her hands in her dress as they stand in the crowd and wait for the results.

District 3's mayor is a tired man who is friends with Kaytlyn's parents. Kaytlyn recalls him showing up at their New Year's party every year, but not much else. She doesn't remember seeing him anywhere else aside from the parties and the reaping.

His face is flat with boredom all the way up until he goes to read the names of this year's District 3 tributes. Apparently, their District escort unexpectedly caught a bad case of food poisoning just before the reaping and won't be able to call the names.

The first one is an older boy by the name of Luis Geronimo. Kaytlyn watches alongside her friends and the rest of the children from District 3 as the camera focuses in on the boy, whose expression is filled with frustration as he makes his way out of the crowd to the stage.

The second one is an older girl, Molly Ziroine, who loudly calls out that she isn't a Mu.

"I'm not!" she says, her voice firm and clear through the speakers as the camera crew follow her and the Peacekeepers escorting her to the stage. "I am _not_ a Mu! You have the wrong person!"

Kaytlyn winces at her protests and her exclamations that the machines were wrong and she isn't a Mu.

No one listens to her, even as she gets to the stage and stands there with her arms crossed. She looks like she's telling the truth.

Can the machines go wrong? Kaytlyn doesn't have time to ponder it before the mayor is announcing the third and final tribute.

She sees the shock on the mayor's face. The camera picks up on it, as well, and Kaytlyn feels a wave of unease pass through her. Finally, though, the mayor opens his mouth and clears his throat.

"Kaytlyn Coranat!"

Kaytlyn freezes, horror washing over her.

She can't smile and make this go away, can't argue her case because it's true. She is a Mu.

She looks to her right and sees Kyra's confused expression, and beyond that the fear in her classmates' eyes.

It's – humiliating. To be seen as something less than human, less than a dog even.

Kaytlyn ducks her head and sucks in a deep, shaky breath. She can't avoid this or get out of it. She needs to hold her head high and walk to that stage. It's her only chance.

But glimpsing Kyra and Miya's faces out of the corner of her eye makes her cheeks flush with shame. She didn't want them to know like this, for everyone to see her as a freak without her being able to defend herself.

She has to start walking. She can't let them throw one more indignity upon her – to be dragged up there kicking and screaming.

Kaytlyn takes a deep breath and takes a step forward.

She can do this. She has to do this. If she doesn't, then she'll be a goner.

* * *

Like I said, I had to condense some of it or else it would have gotten a bit boring.

Luis Geronimo belongs to BabyRue11. Kaytlyn Coranat belongs to Golden Moon Huntress. Molly Ziroine belongs to mukkou.


End file.
